Strain drains Allen
Accuracy slips in 2nd half as oblique tightens
COLUMBIA, Mo. — Arkansas quarterback Brandon Allen said before this week he didn’t know what an oblique injury meant. Now he knows all about it. It was an injury to his oblique — a muscle in the abdomen — that affected Allen on Friday when No. 17 Missouri rallied to beat the Razorbacks 21-14 at Faurot Field.
Arkansas Coach Bret Bielema called it a hip injury after Allen was injured last week against Ole Miss, but Allen confirmed Friday that it was the oblique on his right side.
Allen took all 60 of Arkansas’ offensive snaps Friday despite the injury, and he completed 13 of 30 passes for 133 yards and 2 touchdowns without an interception.
“You could see the determination of B.A.,” Bielema said. “It was 100 percent effort. He just wasn’t 100 percent [healthy]. Still, we thought he gave us the best chance to win.”
It was Allen’s 23rd Arkansas start, including 19 consecutive going back to the final eight games last season.
“We knew it was going to tighten up on me,” Allen said of the injury. “It was going to start making me feel a little bit, but I thought I was healthy enough to play, so I played.”
Allen completed 5 of 6 passes for 46 yards on Arkansas’ first possession and completed an 11-play, 70-yard drive with a 23-yard touchdown pass to tailback Jonathan Williams to give the Razorbacks a 7-0 lead.
But Allen struggled to complete passes after that. Several sailed well over the intended receivers’ heads.
“It was hard for me to come through the ball,” Allen said. “I needed to come through and pull down on it, and I was kind of leaning back trying to throw it.”
Allen completed 6 of 20 passes for 56 yards in the second half. He was 1 of 7 on three series in the third quarter, with the completion going to Demetrius Wilson for 16 yards.
Arkansas was 0 of 7 on third-down conversions in the second half after going 5 of 7 in the first half. Six of Allen’s incompletions in the second half were on third down.
Allen said it was difficult to keep the oblique loose, but he refused to use the injury as an excuse.
“I missed a lot of easy throws, throws that I should have made,” he said. “No excuse for those.”
Arkansas Coach Bret Bielema said he was confident when the game started that Allen could play effectively. Last season Allen played through a shoulder injury.
“I think he felt fine,” Bielema said. “It’s when he started getting hit. Those were the plays that really started to bother him.”
Bielema said he considered replacing Allen with redshirt freshman backup Austin Allen — Brandon’s younger brother who played the second half against Ole Miss last week in his first SEC game — but Brandon Allen wanted to stay in the game.
“He wanted to persevere through it, which I admire,” Bielema said. “I probably should’ve maybe forced it on him a little bit, but I knew our guys believed in him as well.”
Allen said he never considered coming out of the game when Bielema checked on his condition.
“He asked me, ‘Are you still good?’ ” Allen said. “I told him I was fine. I wanted to stay in.”
The Tigers didn’t sack Allen, but he took several hard hits, including a personal-foul penalty on defensive end Shane Ray on Arkansas’ last possession.
“If I was going to get up, I was going to stay and play,” Allen said. “I wasn’t going to try to hurt the team. If I felt like I couldn’t play, I was going to come out, give us a better chance with Austin if I was hurting too bad. But I thought I was good enough to play, so I stayed in.”
Arkansas senior offensive tackle Brey Cook praised Allen’s performance.
“The way Brandon played today, it was something he should be credited for,” Cook said. “To see him [play] with that injury and know how bad he was hurting. … It was very cool to see him out there fighting through it.”
“He came out and played under very tough circumstances, and we’re proud of him.”
Allen regained some of his passing touch on Arkansas’ final possession, when he completed two of his last four passes to help the Razorbacks move to the Missouri 37 with 2:13 left before Missouri recovered a fumble by Alex Collins.
Before the last drive, Allen said he told himself he needed to focus more.
“It all came down to focusing on every single throw: Come through this. Come through this,” Allen said. “That’s what I was thinking.”