LSU will have an eight-game SEC schedule in 2024. See which opponent is currently known.

DESTIN, Fla. — After months of debate, the Southeastern Conference will stick with an eight-game conference schedule for football for one year.

SEC presidents and chancellors voted unanimously Thursday to play eight conference games in 2024. The move coincides with Texas and Oklahoma joining the league next year.

What will happen beyond 2024 is still up for debate.

The SEC retained the option to revisit the schedule format in the near future, possibly to add a ninth game, which has had the support of several schools including LSU.

Each school’s 2024 conference schedule will be announced on June 14 during a special prime-time show on the SEC Network, and dates of games will be announced at a later date. However, multiple sources have said that LSU will play Texas A&M in 2024.

The Aggies have been discussed a permanent opponent for LSU in an eight-game format as well as a potential nine-game format, along with Alabama and Ole Miss. For 2024, the SEC will not designate a permanent opponent.

Because the SEC is dissolving its East and West divisions starting with the 2024 season, how many of LSU’s other traditional SEC West rivals the Tigers play is unclear. In the current eight-game format, LSU plays Alabama, Arkansas, Auburn, Ole Miss, Mississippi State and A&M each year out of the West, and Florida as a permanent opponent from the East. LSU also has had one rotating East division opponent, which in 2023 is Missouri.

There have been several sticking points in the way of the SEC moving to a nine-game schedule.

According to CBSSports.com, just five schools — LSU, A&M, Florida, Georgia and Missouri — are firmly in the nine-game camp. Texas and Oklahoma, who do not yet get a vote on scheduling or other SEC matters, also both support nine games.

But enough conference members have concerns about the nine-game format to keep that plan from going forward — at least for now. Chief among them is the uncertainty over whether ESPN/ABC/Disney would pay the SEC for more conference games. The SEC and the media giant came to a 10-year, $3 billion deal in 2020, roughly a year before Texas and OU announced their intentions to join the SEC. 

Another issue is a concern over what a nine-game SEC schedule would mean for the College Football Playoff, which also expands from four to 12 teams for the 2024 season. How much value the CFP selection committee would place on a ninth SEC game — especially when the SEC is expected to annually send more teams to an expanded playoff — is an unknown that gives some schools pause.

“The expanded playoff has to be discussed,” Alabama athletic director Greg Byrne said. “To me, if we’re going to play more Power Five and SEC games, let’s make sure we’re rewarded for the strength of schedule.”

Some schools with weaker football programs are concerned with getting to six wins to be bowl-eligible, preferring to have a winnable fourth nonconference game.

LSU opens this season Sept. 3 in Orlando, Florida, against Florida State, and opens SEC play Sept. 16 at Mississippi State. Despite the change in SEC schedule format, the Tigers are still slated to open the 2024 season on Sept. 1 against Southern California in Las Vegas.