HawgBeat’s Andrew Hutchinson went back and watched Arkansas’ 55-20 season-opening win over Eastern Illinois. Here are his takeaways after seeing the game for a second time…

Quarterbacks

~Cole Kelley was not terrible in the start, completing 9 of 12 passes for 92 yards and a touchdown. However, as you can see in the passing charts below, most of his passes were of the short variety. One throw he’d probably like to have back came on the Razorbacks’ first offensive possession. On third down, he was slow delivering the ball to La’Michael Pettway, allowing the defensive back to come over and break up the pass, nearly coming up with an interception.

~An area of disappointment for Kelley was the run game. Last year, it seemed like defenders bounced off of him and it usually took two or three to bring him down. Instead of absorbing those hits, he went down on first contact. There was one play he tried to run around the edge, but couldn’t outrun a defender and got tripped up. He finished with only four yards on three carries.

~There is no question that the offense moved much better with Ty Storey under center, as he completed 12 of 17 passes for 261 yards and three touchdowns. He was great with the deep balls, completing 4 of 5 passes that traveled at least 20 yards in the air. The only glaring struggle came when he tried to throw to the left, as he was 0 for 3 throwing that direction.

~As for Storey’s touchdown passes, the first one was probably his worst. He nearly threw the ball behind Pettway, causing him to slip while stopping to catch it. The other two touchdowns came on deep balls to Jordan Jones and Pettway. Both of them were slightly underthrown, forcing them to slow down to catch it in stride, but upon further review, it’s easy to see why that was the face. On the long ball to Pettway, Storey did a nice job of moving up in the pocket to avoid pressure and threw the ball without completely setting his feet. On the long ball to Jones, there was a defender closing in and right in his face when he delivered the ball, so it was a good job of still getting it there. Although it wasn’t a touchdown, Storey threw a perfect ball through a tight window on the long gain to Jones that the coaches credited with sparking the offense.

~Interestingly, Storey had a much better day on the ground. He managed to get three yards – all after contact – on a keeper to set up Devwah Whaley’s 1-yard touchdown run. Later, he got around the edge, stiff armed a defender and picked up 10 yards to get a first down. On his touchdown run, Storey outran a defensive lineman to get to the edge and then did a nice job of avoiding a big hit with the defensive back before falling into the end zone.

~The only other quarterback to get on the field Saturday was redshirt freshman Daulton Hyatt. He had a keeper on a read option that lost a couple of yards, but it wouldn’t have mattered who was back there because it seemed like neither Austin Cantrell nor Noah Gatlin blocked a defensive end that blew up the play immediately. Hyatt was also the victim of the Razorbacks’ lone sack Saturday, but he probably should have gotten rid of the ball quicker.