Razorbacks next for LSU after loss to top-ranked Alabama

- Chad Morris and Ed Orgeron face coaching challenges this week to prevent Saturday night’s Arkansas vs. LSU game from being the Dismal Duel of the Dismayed vs. the Disillusioned.

Morris’ Arkansas Razorbacks, 2-7, 0-5 in the SEC West, host Orgeron’s LSU Tigers, 7-2, 4-2 in the SEC West, at 6:30 p.m. Saturday on the SEC Network in the 2018 season finale for Reynolds Razorback Stadium in Fayetteville.

Although there was no cause to expect great things for Morris’ first Razorbacks team trying to do different things with personnel recruited for Bret Bielema’s final Razorbacks team off a 4-8, 1-7 overall/SEC campaigns, both he and the Razorbacks fans and players believed they would better than 2-7, 0-5 at this stage.

Morris, an optimist using that optimism towards recruiting Arkansas’ way out of this abyss, had kept the optimism flowing. Following the nonconference nadir of losing 44-17 to North Texas back on Sept. 15 in Fayetteville, Morris could cite game by game improvements even as the Razorbacks started 0-4 in the SEC. After all, Arkansas was the heavy underdog against then nationally ranked Auburn, and Texas A&M and of course No. 1 Alabama, and also against Ole Miss.

And the Hogs had pitched a 20-0 nonconference shutout over Tulsa before losing 45-31 the SEC game that Morris obviously believed they would win over Vanderbilt.

The Hogs had last week’s open date week, their first and only bye week following nine consecutive game weeks, to heal physical wounds.

However mentally, with last week’s emphasis practicing and scrimmaging redshirts and reserves who obviously won’t have December bowl practices available for extra work, it surely strikes home to the starters that most of their preseason goals now are officially unattainable.

However, he insisted during the postgame of the Vanderbilt loss in Fayetteville, these Hogs owe it to themselves to make a mark on what’s left and leave something on which to build.

“I shared with our team, each and every one of us has to look within,” Morris told media during his Oct. 27 post Vandy press conference. “Quit waiting on somebody else to make the play. We’ve got to make the play. You have to make the play. We’ve got to go back to work. Like I said earlier, our culture is not going to change. What we stand for is not going to change. And we’re going to finish this thing out.”

Off on Friday and Saturday after their Tuesday through Thursday bye week practices, the Razorbacks launched game-week preparations with Sunday’s closed practice.

If the Hogs seems dismayed, certainly Orgeron’s Tigers must feel disillusioned. Playing arguably the nation’s toughest schedule with only a misstep against then nationally ranked Florida, the Tigers had opened beating Miami when the Hurricanes ranked eighth nationally and then defeated nationally ranked SEC rivals Auburn, Georgia, and Mississippi State, plus over Ole Miss in Oxford Moss. and nonconference defeated generally formidable Louisiana Tech.

Other than its 31-0 rout of Southeastern Louisiana, there wasn’t a cupcake in LSU’s pantry.

The body of work reflected in a national No. 4 AP ranking and even better and more important No. 3 ranking in last week’s first College Football Playoff rankings and an approaching Game of the Century type buildup hosting Alabama last Saturday night at the Tigers’ Death Valley in Baton Rouge, La.

The only figurative death in Death Valley was LSU’s national and SEC title hopes.

Alabama’s Crimson Tide rolled, 29-0.

“We had the table set but we couldn’t get it done,” Orgeron said postgame in Baton Rouge of the festive night fallen flat. “We got whipped at the line of scrimmage. Alabama overpowered us. We were ranked No. 3 and they rank No. 1 but tonight we were nowhere close to Alabama.”

The next College Football Playoff rankings will reflect that which Sunday’s AP poll certainly reflected. LSU dropped to ninth after trounced by the Tide.

Now his task, while admitting he must recruit “bigger and stronger” linemen to match Alabama, is extolling his Tigers are better than the rest.

“We’ll look at this (Alabama game film) on To Tell The Truth Monday and get better and move forward and on to Arkansas,” Orgeron said. “We have a chance to have a hell of a season and go on to a big bowl. That’s what I’m looking forward to.”

(Nate Allen covers the Razorbacks for the NEWSTIMES.)