By Foster Nicholas | Sports Editor
Baylor football is set to face off with LSU in the Kinder’s Texas Bowl on Dec. 31 at NRG Stadium in Houston, it was announced Sunday afternoon.
The Bears are on a six-game winning streak, the longest single-season streak under head coach Dave Aranda, and will take on Aranda’s former squad to cap off the season. Before his stint as Baylor’s head coach, Aranda acted as the associate head coach and defensive coordinator with the Tigers from 2016-19, where he won a national championship.
Baylor has a 3-4 record against LSU, with the last matchup being a 21-7 win in the 1985 Liberty Bowl. The Bears are undefeated against the Tigers in bowl matchups, having also won the 1963 Bluebonnet Bowl, 14-7. The green and gold are 14-13 all-time in their 27 bowl game clashes.
The Bears have participated in the Texas Bowl twice with a 1-1 record. In 2018, the green and gold won a shootout over Vanderbilt, 45-38. The other was a 38-14 loss to Illinois on Dec. 29, 2010. Baylor missed out on a bowl game after going 3-9 in 2023 and lost its last bowl game matchup against Air Force, 30-15, in the 2022 Armed Forces Bowl.
After falling to 2-4 to open the season, redshirt junior quarterback Sawyer Robertson and redshirt freshman running back Bryson Washington set program records to end the year sitting at 8-4. Robertson finished the season fifth in quarterback rating (83.9) as he threw for 2,626 yards and 26 touchdowns with just seven interceptions. Robertson also ran for 227 yards and four touchdowns.
Washington became the first freshman in program history to clear the 1,000 rushing yard mark (1,004), recording six 100+ yard rushing games. He ran for 12 touchdowns and caught another, finishing with 1,221 all-purpose yards.
During Baylor’s six-game winning streak, it averaged 41.3 points per game, the most in the Big 12. Over the course of the season, the Bears averaged 34.7 points per game, second in the Big 12, and 25.3 points against, ninth in the conference.
The Tigers finished the season 8-4 with a 5-3 record in SEC play. They finished ninth in the conference averaging 29.3 points per game, and 14th in the conference allowing 23.8 points per game. LSU’s losses came to then-No. 23 USC in Week 1, 27-20; then-No.14 Texas A&M, 38-23; then-No. 11 Alabama, 42-13; and Florida 27-16.
LSU won its last two games of the season and was as high as No. 8 in the AP Poll before falling out two weeks before bowl games were announced.
Kickoff for the Kinder’s Texas Bowl is set for 2:30 p.m. on Dec. 31 at NRG Stadium in Houston.
