Arkansas's defensive line was one of the larger discussion points in Sam Pittman's first press conference of the spring ball season on Monday.
The Razorbacks graded out last in pressure in 2020 and tied for last in sacks per game at 1.4. Pittman already replaced the group's coach but it's going to be a tall task to improve after losing leading tackle Jonathan Marshall and leading edge rusher Julius Coates in the offseason.
Currently, there is no clear front-runner to replace Marshall but they're working to find one.
"Everybody is what we’re looking at," Pittman said with a laugh. "I dunno, you know, at the nose right now it’s (Taurean) Carter and (Isaiah) Nichols and Marcus Miller is where we’re playing those guys right there. We have who have right now and they’ve got to get better and they’re working hard towards doing that."
Nichols got the second-most snaps behind Marshall last season but he was significantly lighter and graded out worse. Carter and Miller, two 2019 signees, have less than 300 snaps between them so far in their young careers but this could be the year they breakout.
Regardless of who wins the job at nose tackle, Pittman is already discussing how Barry Odom can make the pass rush more effective than it was in 2020 with a switch up in strategy.
"I think we're going to have to bring five at times," Pittman said. "We sat back and rushed three. I think we're going to try to get them out of some inside I's on those tackles a little bit more. I think we're going to have change up what we do on first down at times. We've got to put a team in the hole and we didn't do that on a consistent basis last year.
"We've got guys on the team that can rush the passer. We've just got to give them a little bit better chance and widen them out a little bit and let them go one-on-one with tackles instead of getting shifted out from the guards and all those things. Put ourselves in a little better chance of one-on-ones and certainly rush five, maybe six. But in order to do that we've got to get better at man coverage as well."
Arkansas returns several experienced defensive ends in Dorian Gerald, Zach Williams, Eric Gregory and Mataio Soli but Pittman isn't ruling out going after more help if they can find it before the season in the transfer portal.
"We’re certainly looking into the portal at the D-line to see if we can’t find somebody to come help us," Pittman said. "I know we’ve talked a lot about a pass rusher, but we need a run stopper in there, as well, you know. So, we have three scholarships we can push forward if need be, and if we find a guy we think can come in here and start for us or help us tremendously then we would give that scholarship to that."
Arkansas did just that before the 2020 season when they grabbed Xavier Kelly out of the portal from Clemson but even he didn't contribute as much as the Hogs are probably looking for if they're going to add someone new for 2021.
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