Another one gets away from UA late
At least alphabetically, Alabama may lead Arkansas’ football payback list. That happens when Team A loses 13 consecutive times to Team B. One more poll for the Crimson Tide to top.
Arkansas also has a strong revenge motive against Missouri and Texas A&M. Both have extended winning streaks over Arkansas — the Aggies to nine games, the Missouri Tigers to five — in a season that took forever to start and is dragging toward the finish, but as usual finds Alabama No. 1.
Alabama makes its biennial visit to Fayetteville this week for its rescheduled first December meeting with Arkansas, once postponed indirectly because of the coronavirus. CBS saved a prime-time slot Saturday for the rescheduled game in Baton Rouge matching Alabama and LSU, usually a showpiece item on the Southeastern Conference menu. Chalk this one up as another light snack for the Crimson Tide, 55-17, notable mainly for LSU coach Ed Oregron’s sideline outburst after an early Alabama score. Given Orgeron’s fractured speech, who knows what he said, though seasons greetings it was not.
Coach Nick Saban, working on his sixth national title at Alabama and seventh in college coaching, is sure to say all the right things in press conferences this week, that Arkansas is the most improved team in the SEC (if Missouri isn’t) and that the Crimson Tide can’t afford to be caught napping before the SEC championship game with Florida. He might have time to cut another Aflac commercial.
Look for Arkansas to be a
35-point underdog or higher. The Razorbacks merely hope they can field enough healthy players to be competitive for the latest regular-season game in school history. Bowl talk is in the air, though whether a 3-5 team (before playing Alabama) merits such consideration is debatable.
Not that it will take long to name them, but Arkansas could locate a positive note or two from the 50-48 road loss to Missouri, moved to Faurot Field in Columbia from Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City.
One minor note is that after years of promotion, the Razorbacks’ so-called border war with Missouri might actually be a rivalry. If five straight Arkansas losses can’t change the culture of the series, would six straight hold the ticket? Bret Bielema might not be remembered fondly at Arkansas but in 2015, he was the last Razorback coach to beat Missouri.
Who knows, this series could take hold and become another Egg Bowl. Mississippi and Mississippi State play once a year and then talk about it for the next 364 days. (Humor: How many Ole Miss players does it take to change a light bulb? One to screw in the new bulb and three to tell how great the old one was.)
Often, the winning team in such a series gets a strong sendoff to spring practice or charms a prized recruit or two. Sometimes, as Arkansas did Saturday with KJ Jefferson, the losing team gets a look at its quarterback in waiting.
Arkansas could have bolted to the Big 12 with less secrecy than surrounded the game-time decision not to use senior Feleipe Franks. If nothing else, Sam Pittman’s people could volunteer as contestants on “I’ve Got a Secret.”
Pittman said the coaches knew Tuesday that Franks was “dinged up” and might not play against Missouri. The senior quarterback, enjoying a good transfer season (from Florida) despite everything, was ruled out after warming up at Columbia. Besides passing, they looked to Franks for help in the running game with the midweek defection of senior Rakeem Boyd.
A redshirt freshman from Mississippi who quarterbacked some under Chad Morris (but who didn’t), Jefferson had been seen mostly in goal-line packages under Pittman and offensive coordinator Kendal Briles. Missouri’s scouting report on Jefferson could not be extensive.
In only his second start, Jefferson completed 18 of 33 passes for
274 yards and three touchdowns. He looked to be the game’s winning pitcher when Pittman went for two after a late touchdown cut Missouri’s lead to 47-46. After passing to Mike Woods for the
score, Jefferson coolly found the same receiver for the conversion on a ball that went in and out of a Missouri defender’s hand.
Pittman, like Bielema in the same situation against Ole Miss on the road in 2015, seized the favoring moment. The Hogs won that one with Brandon Allen getting a second chance for a two-point conversion after an Ole Miss penalty in overtime. Arkansas scraped by that day, 53-52, in a game largely remembered for Hunter Henry’s backward heave to Alex Collins and Collins’ resulting dash for a first down on fourth and 25.
“In that last drive,” Pittman said, “I told Kendal, ‘I’m going for two. I’m going to end this thing.
We’re having a hard time stopping them; we’re going to seal this game and go home.”
Too bad this one didn’t end when Jefferson connected twice with Woods. The scoreboard clock showed 43 seconds of playing time with Missouri about to get the ball. Advantage: Missouri.
Like other opponents this season, Missouri gashed the outmanned Razorbacks, who lost leading tackler Grant Morgan to injury. The Tigers averaged 7.5 yards per play with Connor Bazelak passing for 380 (32 of 49) and Larry Rountree (with 185) leading the 273-yard ground surge. Bazelak completed 4 of 4 for 54 yards on the last drive and kicker Harrison Mevis, who wasn’t missing on this day, nailed a 32-yard field goal at the gun to send the home team’s fans home happy.
Pittman’s post- game refrain could have been borrowed from nearly any Razorback defeat this season, starting with the Georgia game three months earlier.
“They beat us up,” Pittman said. “Their offensive line whipped us on our defensive line. Their receivers were open. They beat us in man coverage, and they beat us in zone coverage. We couldn’t get to the quarterback. We couldn’t get either runner (Rountree and Tyler Badie, 79 yards) on the ground.”
Arkansas’ kicking game proved a liability as it has since a blocked punt launched Georgia’s second-half comeback in Fayetteville. AJ Reed missed one extra point and had another blocked. Such factors negate the impact of running back Trelon Smith’s 26-for-172 game and receiver Treylon Burks’ 10 catches for 206.
Some day, we might look back in wonder that this team won three games. Some problems can be corrected through coaching, others by recruiting more and better players. Like Alabama does it.