Arkansas Razorbacks Begin Season the Wright Way

A year ago, Arkansas started the season against Western Illinois, an NCAA FCS team.  They began the new era of Razorback football under Bobby Petrino by narrowly escaping a determined effort by an overmatched team through a heroic performance put forth by Casey Dick.  A quarterback who came to Arkansas as a bus driver and left campus after the LSU game last year as the poster boy of things to come.

Much like last year, Arkansas began the season against a FCS squad, but with very different results—returning the opening kickoff for a touchdown and picking off Missouri State on their first offensive possession.  Having bought the game on pay-per-view, I immediately realized that this Razorbacks team came to play.

Offense

Through most of the first half, Arkansas ran a balanced offense, an even number of pass plays, as opposed to run plays.  However, most of our running calls were in the red zone, simply because our vertical passing game was so effective.  Arkansas scored on six consecutive drives on offensive, seven including the opening kickoff.  Arkansas finished with 591 yards of offensive—447 passing and 144 on the ground, with an average rush of 4.8 yards.

Ryan Mallet started at the quarterback position, and finished the day 17 for 22 with 309 yards, and one touchdown.  His 14 yards-per-completion was second only to Jimmy Clausen for Notre Dame on opening Saturday.  He completed his first nine passes before throwing an incompletion in the end zone to Michael Smith.

Overall, in splitting time with Tyler Wilson, I thought Mallet played as advertised.  He has amazing arm strength, but also showed a little touch.  His only touchdown was a 40-yard swing pass to Joe Adams, which he floated right into Adams's hands without Joe having to break stride.

Tyler Wilson also played a good game, but on several occasions, he appeared to have trouble with the snap sequence and locating receivers on plays where he began under center.  He finished the night going 13 for 19 with 138 yards, with two goal-line touchdown passes—one to Cobi Hamilton, and one to Van Stumon.

Michael Smith had limited touches today, running the ball just four times for 43 yards and a score, while catching two passes for 19 yards.  It was pretty much running back-by-committee with the USC transfer Broderick Green getting the most carries at 10, albeit the majority of those were during goal-line situations, with Petrino trying to establish Green as Arkansas's hammer into the end zone.

True freshman running backs looked impressive as Ronnie Wingo logged eight carries for 50 yards, most of which came in the second half, and Knile Davis got his number called once and responded with a 15-yard dash around the left side of the offensive line.  Our running backs looked very impressive in the limited action that they saw.  Knile Davis reminded me of a certain Arkansas running back from the early Nutt era endearingly referred to as C4.

The pass-catching and route running ability of Arkansas' receivers proved to be light years ahead of last season's squad.  Last year, Arkansas relied heavily on the play of D.J. Williams providing a majority of our offensive receiving yards, but in the game last night, it was a veritable free-for-all, with virtually all of the Razorback's showing a much better understanding of the offense.

Jarius Wright proved to be the most impressive, finishing with six catches and 139 yards, but fellow sophomores Joe Adams and Greg Childs proved that they also had something to offer.  Joe Adams flashed elite speed on a swing pass simply outrunning several defenders down the sideline for a 40-yard score. 

Greg Childs showed soft hands and his tenacity when he caught a ball late in the second quarter and dragged two defenders an extra five yards to get out of bounds and preserve a scoring drive, which was Arkansas's first attempt at a two-minute offense in the young season.  Equally impressive was the true freshman from Texarkana, Cobi Hamilton. He showed the awareness to get open on several plays, most especially a goal line touchdown reception from Tyler Wilson.

Our offensive line play was a great deal better than last year, after giving up four sacks a year ago, they began the season with excellent pass-blocking.  Mallet took a couple of shots that I can remember from the game, but those were more from blown assignments by running backs than the offensive line. 

The Arkansas running game showed room for improvement.  It wasn't really needed as Missouri State allowed Arkansas to complete pass after pass.

Defense

On the defensive side of the ball, the Razorbacks again showed that they were much improved from a year ago.  Missouri State sustained two scoring drives in the first half, with nine plays resulting in a field goal and 10 plays resulting in a touchdown, but both drives were a result of starting on the Arkansas 40-yard line. 

Throughout the entire game it became more and more apparent that this game was about stopping the run.  At every whistle blown signaling a downed Missouri State offensive player, you could count up the three Razorback defenders surrounding the ball, but in most cases, it was upwards of five.  Were it not for Missouri State's All-American tight end, Clay Harbor, I doubt they would have cracked 150 offensive yards.  Even with him, however, Arkansas held Missouri State to 205 yards.  Gaining 123 yards through the air, and 82 yards on the ground for a rushing average of 2.3 yards.

The Arkansas defensive line returned four starters from a year ago, and it showed.  Playing downhill most the game, Arkansas camped out in the Missouri State backfield, getting a good push from the line of scrimmage.

The most notable difference between this year's linebacking core and last year's was size.  Jerry Franklin and Wendel Davis both appeared to have gained much-needed size without sacrificing any speed.  Davis was the most impressive from this unit, as he finished with an interception and a sack.

Arkansas's secondary appeared to be the most shaky defensive unit in the game, as Missouri State's tight end gashed Arkansas several times for big yardage.  Overall, though, they showed a lot of improvement this year, as opposed to last year.  The highly-touted Darius Winston got in the game late in the second half, and showed a nose for the ball when he delivered a big hit on the Bear's running back at the line of scrimmage.

Special Teams

Aside from the opening kickoff return, Arkansas's special teams proved to be the most lacking in ability and execution.  Kicking off three times and showing poor kickoff coverage when they did kick it in-bounds, Arkansas has a long road to hoe before they face Georgia in two weeks.  Alex Tejada was shaky at first, barely making his first two extra points and hooking them hard left.  He settled down, however, and finished the night two-for-two on field goals and six-for-six on extra points.  He also had a touchdown saving tackle during one of his kickoffs.

Overall

I thought the Razorbacks played a good game, and looked much improved from last year.  Ryan Mallet came out and proved why he was number one on the depth chart, answering a lot of questions Arkansas fans had pertaining to just how talented he really is.

The defense did their job, coming out in the second half making the needed adjustments, and shutting out Missouri State from that point on. 

The receivers were perhaps the most improved from last year.  London Crawford made a couple of good catches before going down with an injury in the first half and missing the rest of the game. 

It was apparent that Petrino didn't open up his offense, sticking to fundamental plays and relying on Arkansas to have better execution while letting their talent do the work.  I'm very excited to see Petrino call the Georgia game in two weeks, as it promises to be the first time Arkansas gets to see Petrino call his style of offense without being hindered by the ability of his offensive unit.  It should prove to be an eye-opening experience for not only Arkansas fans, but the SEC, and the rest of the nation as well.

Go Hogs!