Arkansas will face the Mississippi State Bulldogs this weekend on the Hill in beautiful Fayetteville, AR. With Western Kentucky, top ranked LSU, and Missouri left on the schedule, the matchup with the Bulldogs is probably the best chance the Hogs have left to win an SEC game this year.
Mississippi State relies on an excellent run game that’s good enough to be ranked in the top half of the SEC. The Bulldogs passing game isn’t near as good and the same could be said for their defense.
Here are some keys to the game for the Razorbacks:
Find a quarterback
The Hogs are eight games in and still haven’t found the guy yet. The back and forth decisions between Starkel and Hicks obviously isn’t working. There hasn’t been a steady quarterback in the two seasons that Chad Morris has been coaching at Arkansas and their record reflects that. Teams that run a multi-quarterback system typically don’t do well. The coaching staff needs to find someone who can play and stick with him.
That being said, if the guy that they do start isn't moving the ball effectively in the first quarter, they can't wait until halftime to make a change.
Stop The Run
Like Kentucky, Mississippi State is practically one-dimensional. The Bulldogs forte is the run as they’re ranked sixth in the SEC in rushing. The Bulldogs even boast the conferences leading rusher in Kylin Hill. Even their true freshman quarterback Garrett Shrader is ranked 10th in rushing in the SEC with 504 yards in seven games. Mississippi State’s weakness is in the passing game where they rank 11th in the SEC. Arkansas needs to stop the Bulldog run game and make the freshman quarterback win with his arm.
Create Turnovers
The turnover game is crucial to winning ball games. Go figure, but Arkansas ranks last in the SEC in the turnover margin. Despite Arkansas’ defense having 12 forced turnovers, the Hogs are second to last in the conference in turnovers given up with 17. The only other team to have lost more turnovers than Arkansas is Mississippi State at 18. The reason that they aren’t ranked last over Arkansas is because the Bulldogs have forced 16 turnovers compared to the Hogs’ 12. We’ll probably see a lot of balls lost in this game, but the team who can limit their turnovers the most will most likely win the game.
Execute drives
Each game Arkansas typically puts a couple of decent drives together, but they ultimately come to a halt either by a turnover or a costly foul. The Hogs rank 10th in the conference in third down conversions and dead last in the SEC in red zone conversions. This is a major contributor to the Razorbacks losing games. Thankfully, Mississippi State ranks 13th in the SEC for opponent red zone conversions, which is actually one worse than Arkansas. The Hogs need to turn their red zone woes around if they want to win and the Bulldogs are the perfect opponent for it.
Kickoff starts at 3:00 p.m. Saturday at Donald W. Reynolds stadium.
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.
