Hogs looking for toughness, ball security in 1st scrimmage

FAYETTEVILLE - Media was kept entirely off Arkansas Razorbacks limits Friday as the Razorback prepped for today’s closed scrimmage.

It’s the first scrimmage of the preseason as the Razorbacks work towards the Aug. 31 season-opener against Portland State at 3 p.m. Saturday at Reynolds Razorback Stadium.

The scrimmage should be the first major depth chart hurdle as a number of positions, including and especially quarterback, are hotly contested one week into the preseason.

“Saturday will be the big scrimmage,” Morris said when last meeting Tuesday with media. “Really what we want to see is consistency. We want to see what we’ve been seeing in practice. We want to see the mistakes that were made in practice not being made again on Saturday. That’s really what we’re after.”

Of course with an intrasquad scrimmage usually the defense’s joy marks the offense’s sorrow and viceversa.

“We’re after guys making plays,” Morris said. “Protecting the football. And I think defense created three turnovers again (Tuesday), which is big. That’s our goal defensively and we have to protect the football offensively.”

Morris was asked about improving the toughness he said the Hogs as a team lacked during their 2-10 season last year.

“It’s been a noticeable transformation, but a lot of that has to do with our EXPECLITTLE

tations,” Morris said. “This is what we expect, this is how we’re going to do it, we’re going to do it this way and if you don’t do it this way then we’re going to find somebody else who is going to do it this way. You have to play with a toughness, an edge, and that’s something that was set in January and we’ve kept working on that edge and that toughness all the way through our fourth-quarter phase. It’s been noticeable.”