TAMPA, Fla. — Arkansas had work to do in the second half if it was going to reach its goal Dominique Johnson revealed earlier in the week.
With their sights set on the Outback Bowl record for rushing yards, the Razorbacks came up just short of the mark, but still handled Penn State 24-10 inside Raymond James Stadium on Saturday.
After running for just 105 yards in the first half - including only 11 in the second quarter - Arkansas finished with 361 to tie its school record for a bowl. It was shy of the 400 yards by Wisconsin in 2015, but still the second most ever in the 36-year history of the Outback Bowl.
The Razorbacks flipped the switch immediately, driving 75 yards on seven plays after receiving the opening kickoff of the second half. Making it even better, they did it in “Arkansas style,” head coach Sam Pittman said, as all they kept it on the ground the whole way.
The key to Arkansas’ success, Penn State coach James Franklin said, was the quarterback run game, as KJ Jefferson broke several tackles as he accounted for 46 of those yards on four carries.
It was evident that the Razorbacks made an adjustment and the drive seemed to kick-start their offense.
“They went with zone read on the perimeter, then they went zone read inside where they were reading the linebacker,” Franklin said. “If he ran over the top with the running back, they pulled it and hit the quarterback inside.”
Jefferson’s first three runs of that drive went for 10-plus yards and the fourth would have, as well, but he needed only eight to score a touchdown. He also ran for 19 yards on the first play of the next drive, which ended with a field goal, and for 34 yards on the first play of the drive after that.
“That’s when KJ started taking off,” Pittman said. “The read was there. So we had two options off of those three plays with the read, which the read became very, very big for us.”
As he has all year, the 245-pound quarterback never shied away from contact, lowering his shoulder and fighting for extra yards. In fact, he was slow to get up after his aforementioned 34-yard run and had to come out of the game.
In the postgame, Pittman recalled telling Jefferson earlier in the year that he could go right or left to avoid getting hit instead of trying to go through a defender, but Jefferson told his coach he wanted to make a statement with his physicality.
"The definition of KJ Jefferson is a grown man,” linebacker Grant Morgan said. “The way he played so hard. I'm glad he's on my team, or was on my team. I'm glad I'm not the one tackling him anymore."
Even factoring in five sacks, which lost 24 yards, the redshirt sophomore finished with a career-high 110 yards on 20 carries. He is the first Arkansas quarterback to rush for 100 yards since Matt Jones did it in back-to-back games in 2004.
Jefferson said he knew he’d be asked to run the ball more than usual based on the bowl practices and then during the game, offensive coordinator Kendal Briles pulled him to the side and told him that he’d eventually need to take over the game. The result was Jefferson - who also completed 14 of 19 passes for 90 yards and an interception - being named the Outback Bowl MVP.
“This whole week, we’ve been talking, going back and forth,” Jefferson said. “He said I had a higher chance of winning this because (Treylon Burks) opted out. … It’s a dream come true.”
It wasn’t just Jefferson, either. All four of Arkansas’ top running backs had multiple carries, with three of them ripping off at least one run of 10-plus yards.
Freshman Rocket Sanders got the most work, with 13 carries, while Johnson finished with 11, AJ Green got four and Trelon Smith had two.
“I ain’t gonna lie - coming to college, I thought it was going to be a selfish game,” Sanders said. “I thought it was going to be a lot of people just trying to get to the NFL. … I feel like being together, as a group, it’s great.”
Much like he has the second half of the season, Johnson earned the start, but got only six carries despite averaging 8.2 yards. He finished the game with 85 yards and a 7.7-yard average.
“I thought he got tired,” Pittman said. “I didn’t feel like he was running real, real fast in there, but he did some good things. We weren’t blocking him too good early, he made some guys miss, made some plays out of it.”
Johnson’s night ended when he had to be helped off the field following a 6-yard run early in the fourth quarter. Pittman didn’t have any update on his status, but said Johnson told him he was fine after the game.
Playing in front of numerous family and friends just a couple hours from his hometown of Rockledge, Fla., Sanders found the end zone twice on short runs and finished with 79 yards.
“He is tough,” Pittman said. “He’s had that shoulder jacked up for a while now. I think he played really hard. What, did he score a touchdown or two today? He’s probably pretty happy about that. I know I was.”
While Green and Smith finished with 26 and 6 yards, respectively, backup quarterback Malik Hornsby was actually Arkansas’ fourth-leading rusher and had more yards than any one of Penn State’s players.
With Jefferson getting banged up, Hornsby filled in and ripped off a 32-yard run on just his second snap. He also finished the game for Arkansas, as Pittman said he wanted to give him some work, and he added runs of 24 and 18 yards before losing 7 yards on his final carry.
As a team, the Razorbacks averaged 6.2 yards per carry and ran for 256 yards after halftime - including six yards lost on a pair of kneel downs at the end of the game. It seemed like they wore down Penn State’s depleted defense - which was down five starters due to opt outs.
Although he didn’t want to bring it up, Franklin agreed with that statement when asked about it in the postgame press conference.
“Obviously nobody wants to hear me say that, but was that a factor in the game? Yes,” Franklin said. “Obviously we had a depth situation and we had a bunch of guys that played a bunch of football today that really hadn’t played a bunch of football all year long.”
