FAYETTEVILLE - For all its defensive troubles in recent weeks, credit Arkansas for being able to make in-game corrections.
While not down by as many points as the game before, the No. 10 Razorbacks made the right adjustments for the second consecutive week Saturday in a 38-14 win over No. 15 Auburn at Donald W. Reynolds Razorback Stadium.
Like Texas A&M last week, Auburn carved up the Razorbacks’ defense with its run game. The Tigers scored twice in the first quarter on a 55-yard touchdown run from Michael Dyer and a 7-yard touchdown run by Kiehl Frazier – both Arkansas natives playing the first collegiate games in their home state.
It wasn’t the start the Razorbacks were looking for after giving up 381 yards and five touchdowns on the ground last week to the Aggies. After one quarter, Auburn had 141 rushing yards Saturday and looked well on its way to adding more company to Arkansas’ misery.
But like last week, Arkansas overcame a rough start to close out a win. The Razorbacks allowed just 150 yards on the ground and – thanks in large part to three second half interceptions – kept Auburn out of the end zone in the final three quarters.
“We got off to a little rocky start, but defensively we played real well,” Arkansas coach Bobby Petrino said. “We shut them out in the second half and created turnovers. We’ve been waiting for these turnovers to come and did a nice job of that.
“I think we just tackled well and got them behind the sticks.”
RELATED VIDEO: Bobby Petrino – Auburn Postgame
The Razorbacks (5-1, 1-1 Southeastern Conference) were able to key in on the Tigers’ run game. With Auburn’s top receiver, Emory Blake, sidelined with an injury, the Tigers were unable to move the ball through the air.
Frazier and Barrett Trotter combined to complete only 9 of 25 passes for 104 yards and were intercepted three times. Auburn’s longest pass play was a 44-yard gain on a flea flicker early in the second half.
“We just made the plays,” said Arkansas defensive end Jake Bequette, who returned after missing three straight games with a hamstring injury. “In the last three quarters we got pressure on the QB and played our butts off.”
While Auburn (4-2, 2-1) struggled, Arkansas was spectacular again in the passing game. A week after setting a school record for pass yards, Tyler Wilson was efficient again by completing 24 of 36 passes for 262 yards and two touchdowns.
Wilson’s 5-yard touchdown pass to Jarius Wright shortly before halftime gave Arkansas the lead for good and his 18-yard pass to Dennis Johnson capped the scoring in the fourth quarter. The Greenwood native also added a rushing touchdown.
At one point, Wilson completed 19 consecutive passes – just four off the NCAA record and third-best in SEC history.
“We got in a good rhythm,” Petrino said. “He did a nice job of getting his feet set and understanding what they were trying to do coverage-wise. I thought the receivers made a lot of nice plays for him and we protected better.”
The Razorbacks rushed for 176 yards, though 92 came on a Joe Adams touchdown run midway through the third quarter. After Auburn took 7 minutes, 2 seconds off the clock with its opening possession of the second half, Arkansas needed just 15 seconds to break the game open.
Adams, a receiver, lined up in the backfield on the play and took a quick pitch from Wilson. He was aided by a pair of big blocks from Kiero Small and Chris Gragg, and raced untouched down the left sideline to give the Razorbacks a 28-14 lead.
The run was the second-longest in school history.
“I believe in that play,” Arkansas offensive coordinator Garrick McGee said. “You get the ball to Joe Adams as fast as you can get it to him.”
Arkansas likely isn’t going to be a defense that dominates from buzzer to buzzer like an Alabama, LSU or Oklahoma this season. But when the Razorbacks’ offense is rolling the way it has been in the team’s five wins this year, it doesn’t have to be.
Despite its inefficiency at times Saturday, the Razorbacks still managed a comfortable 24-point win over a ranked opponent and snapped Auburn’s 11-game win streak against SEC foes.
“That was a really good win for our football team,” Petrino said. “It took the whole team to win it – offense, defense and special teams.”
Arkansas now goes into its bye week a game behind LSU and Alabama in the SEC West. The Razorbacks have winnable road games at Ole Miss and Vanderbilt when they return to action, followed by three consecutive home games with South Carolina, Tennessee and Mississippi State.
It isn’t inconceivable to think Arkansas could have 10 wins heading into its season finale at LSU on the day after Thanksgiving.
“I think we’re in a good spot,” McGee said. “There’s no doubt we wish we were 6-0, but we’re not. We can’t look back; we’ve got to look forward.
“I see our team getting better each day. If we continue in that process and continue to focus one game at a time, then maybe we can accomplish our goals.”
You can follow Matt Jones on Twitter @NWAMatt.
Isn’t this nice. We used to dream of a time when top 10 rankings, and getting to a New Years Day bowl would be the expectation going into the season. And the BCS would be the goal. Not something we lucked into.
I agree with you Matt. I think we’ll be 10 and 1 going into LSU, and playing, again, for the Sugar Bowl. How cool is that. The Citadel, and playing games with 25 over – times seem but far, distant, nightmares from days gone by.
WPS!!
I think that LSU game will once again be a play-in for the second BCS bowl spot for the SEC. Assuming Alabama beats LSU. If LSU beats Bamma, then it is a play-in for the SEC championship.
Tremendous effort. The OL is starting to come together and play better as a unit and Tyler Wilson is the best quarterback in the SEC. The bye week should help with the healing process.
Very nice to put a beat down on these guys, especially number 5. If the Razorbacks continue to improve, can regain and maintain some health, good things are going to happen.
You can still critique Willie and the defense as improvement is needed to be on playing field as a National Champion, but the defense played GREAT 2nd quarter through the end. They eventuallly did shutdown the road forcing Auburn to throw in to the heart of the defense. Tackling was vastly better and the long run Dyer was bad defensive formation much like Adams long run caught Auburn in an offside blitz.
If we win out Cotton Bowl would be a joke, we will be BCS if only loss is to Alabama and NOT playing in NC game. I think Cotton Bowl is our most likely scenario even if we lose two more.
But for now, I will settle for 4 quarters of defense against Ole Piss and domination that allows us to play more of our depth as we allow all to heal.
observations,
opinions appreciated.
number 1 we won, and there is no number 2
we beat a team that could not throw the ball last night. they rushed for almost 200 yards in the first half. willie never stacked the line, cut off the run and force them to pass. we will never win the SEC with a defensive plan that poor. remember before the season, the thought was our young offensive line and QB needed as much help as they could get. our defense, especially the line was the strength of this team.
or did our coaches know auburn couldn’t stay with us and kept everything in front of the defense and make them work for everything and get nothing cheap.
something is wrong with joe adams, other than the TD run, he has been missing in action, he must still be hurting or wilson just puts his focus on wright on long passes.
after the adams TD petrino shut it down with some 12 minutes left, just wanted to kill the clock. don’t remember seeing that side of him before.
it may be good for us that knile davis got hurt, nobody was going to run behind our line. that will change next year.
ESPN announcers said several times wilson was the best QB in the league. i think he is better than mallett. great touch, can move and very tough. when petrino is your coach, all the big time QB’s want to be a hog.
Hogs are now becomeing the Tough Hardnose Football Team i had hoped they would be,please lets don,t start off with 3 cupcakes anymore,need to have at least one Tough game in the first Three.
I am concerned by how the offense just shut down in the second half. They struggled to make a single first down. There was a long stretch of 3 and outs. Still, a great win and a well-timed bye week before two away games against teams we should beat.
Razorred,i wondered about that to,don,t know if it was the offense or Coach Petrino not wanting to bury Auburn,in the second half i beleive the Hogs could have scored 2 more Touchdowns had they wanted to,plus i think Coach P wanted to see about Hog,s running Game.
Geezer,
I think you hit a number of points on the head. Some of which serious football fans and coaches appreciate. Understand, I do not support or condone a Fire Willy rant. I think that is silly for this team right now and I support Willie 100%. With that said, it is inexcusable for him to start this game NOT PREPARED to SHUTDOWM the run. Tackling was good, so it was not the players but the formation and coverages. Mitchell literally ran away from Dyer TD following a receiver across the middle. If they were man to man who had outside containment? Why would you EVEN be man to man against Auburn; they can’t throw but are known to want to run the damn ball?
Finally I wish the criticism of Wingo “Cease and Desist”. Run game improvement is directly proportionate to O line play. If you look at end result box numbers, all the backs are getting the same numbers. Geezer is right no blocking no run game. With that said; it is understood that Johnson has more pow wow (that it factor), but Johnson’s skills is not a negative for Wingo or Green.
Some tend to forget, that Wingo & Curtis played the first few games because Green, Davis & Johnson were hurt, they also did it while the O Line was learning, don’t believe they are learning ask Wilson? You read some posts and some act as if CBP does not know what he is doing when he played Wingo.
At the end of the day, short of special teams lapses, and a interception we had a shot at beating Bama. We are where MOST expected us to be. I hope we can continue to critique the players and coaches, but we should be supporting them 100% by offering constructive criticism.
I would think recruits read these posts or at least their families. It is good to be a fan but be responsible, at least the majority of us anyway.
I will be Auburn and LSU’s biggest fan when they play Alabama. Go TIGERS!!!!!!!!!!!!!
RazorRed and Hogjim,
The second half performance started as a result of how the second quarter ended. Had a chance to work on the 2 minute drill and put Auburn away going in at the half, but for some reason got real conservative and went 3 and out.
It wasn’t entirely evident that Auburn couldn’t pass until the end of the 2nd quarter.
I love what Petrino because when you think about it, it’s exactly what Alabama did to us a few weeks ago. They knew they were better that day, so they shut it down. After the Adams TD, it was evident that we were just better. Auburn hadn’t scored since the 1st, they started trying to run trick plays because their offense was failing. Once we picked them off the second time, it looked like they tapped out, which is awesome.
Welcome home, Dyer and Frazier. At least you won the first quarter! And don’t let the door hit you on your way back to Alabama.
Anyone knows who goes to the SEC Champ game from the West if it is a 3 way tie LSU, Bama & Arkansas?
Somehow, I think we get screwed as it seems at times customary policy for us in SEC. Unless some other team (besides LSU) can trip Alabama, I keep thinking our best case scenario is for Bama to win out and go undefeated, we beat a #2 or #3 LSU hope OU or Wisconsin get beat. We may have enough BCS points based on SOS for NC game? Ourt only loss will have been to #1 Alabama and we played them eraly when we were not at strength. After all of the LSU Bama noise and if Bama wins and we beat LSU too; who knows?
The Bevo league has a easy pass. Looks like OU/OSU winner goes to NC game which does seem easy to me. We need A&M to stand up to defend the SEC so we can get two spots in NC game.
Hog Authority,
If we get caught in a fatal three-way, the tie goes to the team with the highest BSC ranking. So, yes, we would get screwed because they will always put Alabama ahead of us. We need win out and Bama to lose twice to have any realistic hope.
Exactly, and that is why I am hoping for scenario where we are clear #2 in BCS. If Bama is clear #1 our caused is aided.
I think it is more likely OU, OSU, & Wisconsin lose once than Bama losing twice? I think we would eventually jump Stanford and Boise St assuming they do not lose?
Just thinking and dreamim…
I would like to see us move to #8 today. I think we should jump Oregon & Clemson. Who has Oregon Beat? Clemson beat Auburn but we destroyed Auburn. Those ACC fanatics had Florida State #4 and they have lost 3 games!!! They hate the SEC domination.
Getting conservative with a lead might be nice to the opposing team, but it isn’t doing our team any good. Getting complacent leads to mistakes and poor play. I wish we would keep the foot on the gas all the way through, so we can get used to having that mindset and also because it would force us to stay crisp and will better hone the offensive machine.
I won’t try to speak for CBP because I do not know what his thinking was? I do wish to learn. However, is it possible that CBP felt that he wanted to take advantage of the lead and work on what is causing his offense the most grief? If you take out the one run by Joe Adams we had 30 rushes with Johnson and Green and only managed 2.8 yards per carry!!! They have two weeks to go in the film room to work on the run blocking based on real game conditions… If that is not enough, what if Auburn had managed to take a shot at Wilson? The critics would never forgive CBP for passing or trying to run up the score late with Wilson in the game? We blew Auburn out and we are still just #10; so I think what we did yesterday was to our favor. Nobody else was hurt.
It is to a team’s favor to prove they can put up lots of points and win big. See the rankings of Oklahoma State and Boise State.
I’d love to see us move up, but I wouldn’t bank on it. Time is on our side though.
I should probably let this go because I see some of you are actually serious about not running up the score?
Hard to believe 38 – 14 victory with no injuries and chance to work on running game is not good enough? If we played the same schedule as Okla State and Boise State we would be undefeated and ranked top 6 as well. Besides you might say we beat A&M better than Okla State? Go to the Auburn blogs, they are shut up pretty good. The Bama folks are rubbing it in their noses. Hopefully Auburn got humiliated enough to Beat Bama. I hope we beat Ole Piss soundly; but I hope CBP does not just try to run up the score to humilate Nutt or get him fired that evening. On the other hand, I hope CBP is working to get DJ, Green and Wingo some running room and putting some heat on Willie to play run defense for 4 quarters. We need the latter to truly have shot to run the table.
im not even thinking BCS Bowl,just TAKE THEM ONE AT A TIME HOGS,and that Bowl will take care of itself.
And we need to beware of South Carolina. Just because we blew them out the past two seasons doesn’t mean it will happen this season. Their greatest strengths (pass rush and running ball) are two of our biggest weaknesses (protecting the passer and run defense). Those who think we’ll waltz to the LSU game need to put away the dancing shoes. We still have some tough teams on the schedule.
Beating Ole Miss by a large margin would not mean that Coach Petrino was trying to get Coach Nutt fired. Nobody said that.
It would mean he was trying to get his offense to play at maximum efficiency. There’s no question that we took the foot off the gas in the second half and we looked terrible when we did.
Skezell, you are right my freind. Willy’s D did shut down the run starting in the 2nd quarter. As HogAuthority stated earlier, that was a no brainer and we should have started that way from the begining. It looked like we played a hell of a defensive game, but you have to look at the times Auburn more than threw for the 1st down to open recievers most of the time that dropped them or inexperianced QB overthrew them. As you say Skezell, that will not be the case Against SC, Tenn.,Miss.ST. and LSU. Tough road ahead and we still got Defense problems. Not blaming the hard working kids, just the schemes we seem to be using. Got to get pressure and have white on rice coverage. Still a long haul.
Looked to me like Auburn has lousy passers(both of them), receivers that can’t catch the ball and the great malzahn just runs gimmicks, what’s all the flip cards on the sideline? They were a one trick pony(Cam) for one year. Dyer looks like he can play but Frazier is way over rated. We just don’t have any run game, not even sure Davis could run behind this line.
Can’t take Ole miss lightly. Can’t just put it in the win column.
Nutt will have his kids ready to play this one. Certainly Arkansas is the better team in all aspects of the game. But the best teams don’t always win. This could be a trap game if mindset is not there. This needs to be a decisive win. Arkansas needs to play like a top ten team from beginning to end. A top ten team is what they should be for the remainder of the season.
BCS polls has Michigan, Georgia Tech, Clemson, Stanford, Oregon and Boise State ahead of Arkansas. Of course we lost to Alabama but we have beaten two top 20 teams one that was ranked #7. When cupcake season run out (in Boise case it does not) we should jump again but we have to keep winning. For BCS; a win is a win and a loss is a loss doesn’t matter what it look like.
MC,
You are right. Nutt likes to lay in the weeds and go for his upset. However, they do have to play Alabama the week before us, so Bama will probably soften up for us a little. That’s still no reason to overlook them, though.
All I know is this. We may not play for a National Championship this year, but it’s coming sooner than later. And for sure, even with the improvements that will come on both sides of the ball, we ARE playing for a BCS spot. And sitting hear in Tucson, watching the complete implosion of the AZ Wildcats, and their coach losing his team, it is really nice to watch CBP leading the Hogs to places we have never been.
Yes, from the 2nd quarter on, the defense played much better, and I was extremely glad to see it. I still think it will take someone other than Willy Robinson to develop a national championship-quality defense for us, but the kids played well for 3/4 of the game Saturday. I actually saw some stunts run by the D-Line. Auburn this year is like most of Nutt’s teams at Arkansas – strong running game, but completely hopeless if forced to pass. (I’m so glad to have Coach Petrino in Fayetteville.)
Where do all of you football experts coach ?
In my opinion i think CBP wanted to see the defence on the field more after we had a good lead to make sure they stayed in their rythem and got some more time against a running offence. It would have been nice to see 1 or 2 more td’s but in the same sence i don’t think CBP wanted to get anymore of his kids hurt so he played conservative. I hope CWR puts together better defensive schemes to start the game so we dont give up the early points and have to make soooo many adjustments during the game.
I’m not even going to talk about bowl games or what will happen if the other teams loose. The Hog’s just need to go out and play one game at a time and never overlook any team in the SEC!
One of the most fun things I do on Sunday or Monday after a game is read the game blogs and website comments because the fair-weather nature of so many fans is revealed. I am probably guilty of it too, but it is amazing how quickly attitudes can change during a game. I think most will agree that if you look at the big picture, we ARE exactly where most folks figured we would be at this point in the season, winning the games we were supposed to win and losing the one game we were supposed to lose. If that continues to hold true, we should go into the LSU game (which my wife and I are going to; first trip to Baton Rouge) with one loss and a Sugar Bowl berth on the line. If we win that game, fantastic. If we lose, Capital One Bowl is a nice consolation. Glad we get the bye this week. We need to get everyone healthy and fine-tune things as much as we can.
Pointing out ways that our team can improve is not being a fair weather fan. If you think so you are ignorant.
Thinking critically is different from being unfairly negative and sour all the time. You have to be critical if you are going to improve.
skezell,you are so right,long tough road to travel down,and South Carolina may be a totally different team with Connor Shaw at QB,but we Have the Best QB in the SEC.
What are the best case scenarios for the Hogs this year?
All of this assumes the Hogs win out (including beating LSU), which is by no means a guarantee. But we’re talking best case so here goes.
If Bama wins on Nov. 5, the best we can do is the Sugar Bowl. Bama will not lose to anyone if they don’t lose to LSU. They’ll be 12-0, 13-0 after beating UGA in the SEC Championship, and headed to the BCS National Title game versus Oklahoma (who also will not lose).
In that case, the best the Hogs can do is the Sugar, which would be great. Probably catch Wisconsin or maybe Boise down there.
If LSU wins on Nov. 5, things get interesting. If the Hogs won the LSU game all three teams would be 11-1 with the SEC title game going to the BCS leader. By then the Hogs would probably be #6 or #7, playing against #1 LSU. Even if Bama loses to LSU on Nov. 5, look for them to stay one slot ahead of us (so, #9) just by virtue of who they have beaten and who they have lost to. It is just possible that a last-minute victory versus LSU could allow us to leap both Bama and LSU in the polls even if all were one-loss teams.
Even if the pollsters kept us at something like #5, #6 and #7, the Hogs would then have the benefit of beating the Bulldogs to boos their last-minute rank. We could still end up in the Sugar…but we could also go to the title game. The winner of the SEC really ought to go every year and the last five years have proven that. The bad news is I think we’d lose to Oklahoma. But I’d take it.
Now the flip side of that coin, if LSU beats Bama in Tuscaloosa, is that if the Hogs went over and lost to LSU it would be the Capital One Bowl for sure.
So who do we root for? LSU or Bama? Personally I am rooting for Bama. I would rather put my hopes on the sure thing of having a chance to give LSU a second loss and go to the Sugar than on the very remote chance that we manage to juke and jive our way into the title game.
ZM
Is there anyway the Hogs could play Oklahoma for the NC.
The problem with a 3-way tie is that in SEC rules, a 3-way tie goes to BCS rankings with a catch: if the team ranked second (for instance Ark is 1, Bama is 2, and LSU is 3) and they are within five rankings of the top ranked team (Arkansas #3 and Bama #5) then the team that won the head to head match-up goes to the SEC Championship game. We would have to play good enough against LSU to get into the Top 3 while having Alabama only be on the cusp
(#9 or 10) of the Top 10 in order to get in, and I do not see that happening if Bama only has one loss. Bama almost HAS to lose twice for us to have a shot. I can see only two teams that have a shot at beating them this season: LSU and Auburn. LSU is obvious, and Auburn gets them at home and is always a tough game for Alabama. Sugar Bowl looks like our best bet right now unless Bama’s bandwagon crashes and burns like it did last year against South Carolina. Still a whole 6 games left to play though so who knows! WPS!
Tom, I think you misunderstood my post. You are absolutely correct that there is nothing wrong with being critical. It’s our right as a ticket-buying fan to express our opinion whether it’s positive or negative. What I was referring to specifically was the in-game chat that was going on during the A&M game which, unfortunately, I could not attend due to a Friday night game here in Memphis that I officiated. During the first half, the comments were mostly about how we are a pitiful team and the coaching stinks and etc. etc. etc. Those same players and coaches came out for the second half and, amazingly, the posts during the second half were slightly more positive. I’m not criticizing those that posted; just sayin’ that it can be humorous to read them.
I do see ways that I think our team can improve (more DJ, less Broderick; nobody but Adams to return punts; more deep routes), but then, Coach P doesn’t need help from somebody ignorant like me. He’s doing just fine and I for one am proud we have him.
hogjim,
best scenario for hogs to play Oklahoma in NC game.
OU goes undefeated.
Alabama loses to LSU and ANY body else.
Arkansas must win out beating LSU to go to SEC Champ game and play your pick of Georgia and win
Regardless of undefeated Wisconsin, Boise St or Stanford, the BCS would have to put SEC Champ Hogs there. Of course they may discrimate because we are Arkansas, A one loss LSU or Alabama would be 100% sure thing. It would help it those three lost.
Dear ascensionhog,
I used to coach for the Chicago Bears. Then I coached Florida State to a National Title; thank you very much. Then I was caught in a scandal involving my team, my defensive coordinator, some babes and a hooka bar. So I “resigned” under pressure and became an analyst on ESPN Deportes.
uuhhh…wait….shoot….sorry. I guess I just watched that on TV. You’re right, I should shut up and get a life.
Have a great week.
Hog Authority, I caught that brother! Oh ya, Thanks for the refrence.
HogAthority, was just wondering if maybe Georgia is still looking like a drug induced pick to you ? HA
Arizona, you gonnna get me fired for lol !!!!
Ascensionhog should know that I was going to be the Head Coach of the New England Patriots until they hired Belichek. I spend 4 hours a week studying football from Gruden on Monday nights. I have read TWO Johnny Unitas books, and I coached my son’s Pee Wee team to the SW North District Region of the North Texas Little League Football Association of Dallas. If that is not enough, I stay in Holiday Inn Expresses throughout the country. I even stayed at the Holiday Inn where the Texas Tech fans put the excrement / fish bait on the Aggies Bus. If required I can fax a receipt to prove it
OK, back to work now, I got an email from my man Willie; and I helping with defensive scheme to stop Homey Bears.
Florida lose 2 QBs, & South Carolina dumps Garcia all bets are off. I ain’t going with Vandy or Tennessee; so I am like Missouri? Georgia is “whats left”
hello!,I love your writing so a lot! percentage we keep in touch more about your post on AOL? I require a specialist in this area to solve my problem. Maybe that is you! Having a look ahead to look you.