The smart boys in Vegas are a lot more learned on these affairs that I am, but here’s bit of advice in advance for them. Go ahead and set the betting line for next season’s LSU-Arkansas game.

The number “3” would probably be right on the dot.

If nothing else, LSU’s 34-31 win over the Razorbacks Saturday proved that, one way or another, that’s where they’ll end up. That’s now four years in a row that the game was has been decided by three points, no matter the odd ways it gets there.

You certainly can’t quibble with the entertainment value Saturday, right down the final second, when, even from 76 yards away, no one could be sure that the final desperate heave by Arkansas’ man-mountain, athletic quarterback K.J. Jefferson, wouldn’t somehow end up in the end zone.

That’s the kind of night it was.

The first half, continuing the day’s trend of ugly SEC games, looked like the first team to manage a touchdown might win. The wild second half looked like the first defense to force a punt might take it.

But it still ended up a three-point LSU win after the Tigers’ winning drive, capped by a Damian Ramos’ chip-shot field goal (three points, as you know) with 5 seconds left in the game.

“These are games you’ve got to find a way to win,” said LSU head coach Brian Kelly, who had no stake in the 18-point spread.

So it ended with Kelly shuffling his full deck of timeouts around like a three-card monte dealer and most of the stadium trying to figure out what was going on down around the north end zone.

Simply put: in a game that eventually had 935 combined yards after a sluggish start, the second half turned Tiger Stadium into a no-punt zone. And yet the final, game-deciding scrum at the goal line was as awkward as your first sixth-grade dance.

LSU needed to score, of course, but, heaven forbid, not too quickly.

“I wasn’t interested in giving Arkansas another chance,” Kelly said.

By this time LSU knew Arkansas couldn’t cover Malik Nabors, at least not without leaving Brian Thomas alone (he had a pair of 49-yard touchdown receptions). But the Tigers, on the other hand, were apparently unaware that Arkansas tight end Luke Hasz (six catches, 116 yards, two TDs) was an eligible receiver and ignored him all night.

So when the Razorbacks tied the score at 31-all with 5:06 remaining LSU went into its slow-down offense from 75 yards away.

It was going according to plan until LSU’s Logan Diggs broke off a 21-yard run to the Hogs’ 7-yard line, still with over 2 minutes remaining.

Too soon. That’s was an eternity with the mischief Jefferson had been up to.

But the Razorbacks had exhausted all their timeouts by early in the final quarter — two on their first drive of the third quarter.

Kelly had his full deck.

Advantage, Tigers.

Just a guess, but that’s when the computers at Football Analytics Headquarters went haywire.

It put Arkansas, with no way to stop the clock, in a weird pickle. Surely the printouts would have told its defense to open up like a Razorback Red Sea and let LSU score, just to get the ball back.

LSU could have countered by just taking a knee and foiling the unorthodox plan. Kelly had already decided a field goal was going to end the drive.

Neither really took the bait.

Diggs struggled honestly for yardage on two carries as Arkansas played real defense and stopped him.

For some reason LSU burned one of its timeouts before running the first-down play. So what if the play clock was running down. A 5-yard penalty doesn’t hurt you there when your goal is stay out of the end zone.

So LSU was out of timeouts after letting the clock run down to 11seconds after the second-down run.

There was a bit of a hush in a wild stadium when the Tigers lined up for a play on third down. What if the play was stopped short? The Tigers probably wouldn’t have time to get the field goal unit on the field.

Not to worry. Jayden Daniels, who was named the Southeastern Conference Offensive Player of the Week on Monday, took the snap and immediately tossed it in the vicinity of the Golden Band from Tigerland to stop the clock and use up a few more seconds.

“We got it down to about five seconds,” Kelly said. “It worked out pretty good.”

He’ll have plenty of tinkering to do, particularly on defense, especially with singed secondary heading into this week’s game at Ole Miss.

But a three-point win is about the best you can ask for in an SEC track meet.

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Scooter Hobbs covers LSU athletics. Email him at scooter.hobbs@americanpress.com