FAYETTEVILLE — The first scrimmage of the spring could not have started worse for Arkansas’ defense.

Devwah Whaley ripped off a run of 40-plus yards and then Chase Hayden scored from 25 yards out on the very next play to give the offense a touchdown on the first drive of the day. That start was at the front of defensive coordinator John Chavis’ mind when he spoke to the media afterward, as he said he was glad it wasn’t a real game.

“We had a miscue on the first play and then I don’t know what happened on the next play, but we gave up two long runs,” Chavis said. “Those are things that we have to eliminate if we ever want to become a good defensive football team.”

After that series, Chavis called together his guys and they seemed to respond well. During the portion open to the media, senior defensive end Gabe Richardson came up with a sack and freshman defensive end Eric Gregory notched a couple.

The defense continued to make plays after the scrimmage was closed and did enough to secure the “Championship Belt” for the third straight practice.

“That next little series after that, we really stepped it up on defense and we flipped that momentum completely,” linebacker Grant Morgan said. “If you would have seen just the first couple series of the offense and defense, then you would have said offense won the day, but after that, it was just a big flip-around. We really brought the momentum and brought the juice with it.”

Although Chavis didn’t want to diagnose what happened in the early going before looking at the film, defensive end Jamario Bell said they were just too amped up for the first scrimmage.

“We came out the first part and we were a little too energized,” Bell said. “We had to settle down and hone in on what we were doing.”

On the flip side, offensive coordinator Joe Craddock was pleased with how the scrimmage started and joked that there were a few holes he could have even run through for big gains.

“I thought today was one of our better days offensively,” Craddock said. “I thought there were some big holes in there, I thought we made some good throws and we did some good things.”

Ultimately, though, the difference was the turnover battle. The Razorbacks didn’t throw any interceptions for the first time since the first practice of spring, but they did cough up a few fumbles.

Freshman Greg Brooks Jr. and junior Deon Edwards each came up with the ball for the second-team defense and the first-team unit had one. The three turnovers trumped all of the positives for the offense and automatically gave the defense the belt.

“The biggest thing is we would have won the belt a couple times, I believe, but we’ve just got to do a better job of taking care of the football,” Craddock said. “Our 2s are turning the ball over a little bit too much and we’re counting that.”

There were also a few bad snaps by Ty Clary, but quarterback Ben Hicks blamed them on the strong winds and said he thought the offense did a good job moving the ball, particularly on first down.

“We turned the ball over three times so that kinda hurts, but I felt like for most of the scrimmage on first down we were really good,” Hicks said. “There was a couple of pre-snap penalties and a snap here and there, but overall we were pretty positive on first down and that kept us out of third-and-longs.”

Although his unit came away with the belt and forced a few turnovers, Chavis was disappointed in how the defense started the day and would like to see them be more consistent as the spring progresses.

“The thing is, you can’t give someone momentum,” Chavis said. “We had some good moments, but obviously you want to start fast and you want to finish fast. That’s what we have to do.”

SUBSCRIBE to HawgBeat and get access to exclusive prospect interviews, the best recruiting network in the industry, inside scoops on recruiting and team news, videos, podcasts and much more.

Join the discussion on THE TROUGH, the Arkansas Rivals premium message board for thousands of Hog fans.