Arkansas' 10 most important players in 2022-23: No. 9 - Isaiah Nichols
The start of Arkansas’ football season is 52 days away, and HawgBeat is going to help make time go by faster by ranking the 10 most important players for the Hogs this upcoming season.
FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — Arkansas’ most questionable position group heading into this fall is the defensive line.
The leader of that defensive line is redshirt senior defensive tackle Isaiah Nichols. This is his fifth season as a Hog, and he will be relied on heavily to plug the middle all year.
Nichols was rated as a Rivals 5.6 three-star prospect coming out of Springdale High School, and it does not feel like he has lived up to his potential yet.
“It’s definitely been a crazy journey leading up until now,” Nichols said on April 14. “I would say I’m proud in the sense that I’m getting better. But, I think I have a lot more left, a lot more growing to do.”
During his first two seasons as a Razorback, Nichols tallied just 18 total tackles to go with one tackle for loss and half a sack. As a redshirt freshman he put together three multi-tackle performances — two of which game against SEC West foes Ole Miss and Mississippi State.
Over the past two seasons, Nichols has started 11 games and recorded 46 total tackles, four tackles for loss and two sacks.
He started seven games during Arkansas’ 2020 campaign, serving as Arkansas’ No. 2 defensive tackle behind Jonathan Marshall. Nichols would line up at defensive tackle in four-man fronts and rotated to defensive end in three-man fronts.
That season he had a career-high 24 total tackles while weighing in around 281 pounds for most of the year. He bulked up to the 290-300 pound range for 2021-22, when he racked up 22 tackles and a career-high 3.5 TFL’s and 1.5 sacks.
Nichols’ play time was limited last season due to transfers John Ridgeway, Markell Utsey and Tre Williams manning the primarily three-man front. Entering this season, Nichols is sitting at 302 pounds and plans to serve as a true starting defensive tackle.
He said during the spring that he's worked a lot on the little things to be more explosive.
“I’ve been really focusing on detail,” Nichols said. “I’ve been working on my feet…Just being consistent with my hands, firing off the ball, being violent, block destruction. Just the details and everything, just trying to fine tune everything. Just trying to be the most explosive player I can be.”
Arkansas head coach Sam Pittman said he noticed Nichols was in the offensive backfield fairly often during the spring scrimmage in April.
“I thought Isaiah Nichols seemed like he was back there by me quite a bit in the pass rushing game,” Pittman said.
Defensive coordinator Barry Odom mentioned during the spring that Nichols had impressed him with the level he was playing at.
“Isaiah right now has probably had the most productive — he and Taurean Carter — of any interior defensive lineman so far this spring,” Odom said on April 9. “He’s played with great on-snap footwork, great eye discipline, great hand placement. He’s playing at a high level.”
Aside from Dorian Gerald, who is back for his seventh season, Nichols has the most experience in Fayetteville of any Razorback defensive lineman. Unlike last season, the team did not bring in three big-time transfers on the d-line, so Nichols will have to pick up the slack.
“Yes, I’m proud of where I’ve come from when I started four years ago," Nichols said. "But, my day-to-day focus is on what I can do better and how I can be better the next practice, or the next game, or the next day than I was the previous day.”