FAYETTEVILLE — The Arkansas Razorbacks (4-3, 2-2 SEC) came back down to earth a little bit Saturday in a 34-10 loss to the No. 8 LSU Tigers in front of the fourth-largest crowd in Razorback Stadium history.
Arkansas was outgained by the Tigers, 384-277, and it turned the ball over three times — twice in critical situations. LSU had 158 rushing yards compared to just 38 by the Hogs, who also gave up three sacks and had none of their own.
Head coach Sam Pittman met with reporters after the game with give his thoughts on all that went down in his team's third loss of the season...
(Opening Statement)
"Well, I want to give credit to LSU," Pittman said. "Very physical football team. Didn't have any turnovers, (Garrett) Nussmeier was really good. Their offensive line was, as well. Defensively, we couldn't run the football on them, couldn't get off on third down.
"There were a lot of things that we've got to get better at. We've got to coach them better, as well, but I thought this was a really good LSU team coming in here. I think they are now, too. Fifty offensive snaps and three turnovers, we have to do better there. We have to get off the field on third down."
(Two turnovers from Taylen Green and Rashod Dubinion?)
Junior running back Rashod Dubinion had the ball poked out from behind on the first play of a drive late in the first quarter, and the Tigers recovered Dubinion's fumble at the Arkasnas 38-yard line. LSU capitalized with a field goal to take a 13-0 lead early in the second quarter.
Even more critical of a giveaway was when quarterback Taylen Green attempted a pass with LSU linebacker Whit Weeks screaming off the edge. Weeks tipped the ball and picked it off before falling down at the Arkansas 2-yard line. The next play resulted in a Tigers touchdown to make it 24-10 midway through the third quarter.
"Yeah, it hurt, big-time," Pittman said of the turnovers. "Because I think R-Dub (Dubinion) got 12 yards on that particular run as a first-down play. I think we had the ball four times in the first half. Really moved it pretty well, then something would go wrong, then of course the interception was a one-play — we got the ball (down) 16-10, everything was coming in what we thought, what we told the kids at half 'We get the ball, we'll get it to a one-score game, whether it's a field goal or a touchdown. We'll get the ball back and we'll take the lead and put the pressure back on them.'
"It kind of was working out that way, but we missed an outside rusher that we should've blocked, then threw the ball, got tipped up and they made the 2-point conversion on top of that. We got down 14 and just seemed like we couldn't bounce back from that."
(LSU had limited big plays in the game...)
The Tigers had just five plays of 10 or more yards and only two plays of 20-plus yards in the game. Nussmeier was 22-of-33 passing for 224 yards and the Tigers had an average of 9.8 yards per completion.
"Just taking what we were giving him," Pittman said. "They were throwing 8 and 10-yard hitch routes, wide-open. Obviously we tried some different things there, tried some man-to-man and tried some zero coverage, total coverage. They were, Nussmeier was really good and their wideouts were really good. We've got to get better because we'll see a lot of that on down through the season, through the end of the season."
(What did you see from LSU run game?)
LSU freshman running back Caden Durham carried the ball 21 times for 101 rushing yards and three scores, while the Tigers totaled 158 yards on 37 carries for an average of 4.3 yards per carry as a team.
"I think their line is pretty good -- really good," Pittman said. "They ran the stretch play well. Ran it so well, we knew it was coming and couldn't stop it. I thought their line did a good job. We didn't tackle particularly well. We made some hits and all that made it second and 4 and second and 5, so I just think that their backs ran hard, their line blocked well, we missed some gaps and we didn't tackle like we had in the past."
(Thoughts on your own run game?)
The Hogs tallied just 38 rushing yards on 19 carries as a team in the loss to the Tigers. Starter Ja'Quinden Jackson was playing on an injured right ankle and he had just five carries for 26 yards. Dubinion and freshman Braylen Russell were the only two backs to carry the ball (7 carries for 18 yards combined).
"Well, we didn't run it that many -- we ran it 19, but whenever you don't make good yards on it -- we did make a 12-yard run and fumbled," Pittman said. "I think this, the passing game there in the first half, I thought it was working well. Actually I thought we were doing a pretty good job, then we just stalled out and having to kick a field goal. Unfortunately he missed it, then came back in the second half and made another one. But, point being, we were just trying to do what we thought had success. We were protecting it pretty well in the first half, and then had some breakdowns there in the second half."
Pittman also added that the ankle injury was something Jackson entered the game with.
"Yeah, he’s had that ankle," Pittman said. "He wanted to go and he had practiced all week. But he just got it tweaked up a little bit again, the same one."
(Demoralizing to get to Garrett Nussmeier and not have sacks to show for it?)
The Tigers had allowed Nussmeier to be sacked just twice all season long, and that number remains the same after the Hogs were unable to get to the LSU signal caller in time Saturday.
"They give up two sacks on the year, so he's getting the ball out," Pittman said. "Obviously, their two tackles are pretty special, even though I thought [Landon Jackson] did a good job of getting around the edge several different times. But you throw a hitch, you don't have to protect it very long. So, yeah, I was disappointed."
(What went into switching up the offensive line tonight?)
For the first time all season, the Hogs switched things up on the offensive line Saturday. Michigan State transfer Keyshawn Blackstock moved from right tackle to left guard, while left guard E'Marion Harris moved the Blackstock's spot at right tackle.
"We actually did that after the game two weeks ago," Pittman said. "We felt like Blackstock could handle the bull a little bit better. We also thought Harris might could handle a little bit more of a speed rusher out there. I'll have to wait and see how it looks. I thought probably we just didn't run the ball as much, but I thought it was a good move.
"I think we'll have (Patrick) Kutas back the remainder of the year, too, so he can add into that flow.But that's why we did it just for the girth of (E'Marion Harris), trying to, you know he's tall, trying to block a 330-pound defensive tackle where we felt like Blackstock could do that. We felt like he could be a little more athletic outside against a smaller guy."
(Didn't run the ball as much tonight. Was that dictated by situations or did you think you'd throw the ball more?)
The 19 carries for just 38 rushing yards was easily the lowest total in both categories for the Razorbacks all year.
"No, I mean, we thought that we could attack their secondary as long as we could protect it," Pittman said. "We thought we could attack their secondary, but the game was just... When the time of possession is so –– I think you may go, 'Hey, this is what I know, we can go attack and let's try to see if we get a little bit bigger play out of it.'
"And I felt like that's what we were trying to do a little bit more than normal, and you can see that we were having a hard time getting off the field, so you might think a little bit more of trying to quick-strike and get more explosive plays. We felt going into the game that we could do that throwing the football."
(What did you see on Green's interception at the goal line?)
Pittman was asked about Whit Weeks' impressive interception play off Taylen Green in the third quarter.
"Well, it was a single off the — to the field," Pittman said. "We had inside zone read-throw combination, read to throw. We didn’t out to him, which we needed to. He came free and we tried to throw off him and he, I believe he’s the one who batted it up and caught it."
(First time you've have had a big loss — how will y’all respond?)
Now sitting with a 4-3 record and a 2-2 mark in conference play, the Hogs will have to get at least two more wins in their final five games to secure bowl eligibility.
"Oh I think we’ll be fine," Pittman said. "I still think we’ve got a good football team. I think LSU’s pretty good. But I think we’ve got a good football team. We have to respond. I mean, we go into Mississippi State and then we got Ole Miss and Texas, we’ve got Missouri, we’ve got Louisiana Tech.
"Got some good teams, but we can… We always want to go to the postseason and we can still do that. Our kids will be excited to try to get to postseason and we’ve got to rebound next week, obviously, because I think Mississippi State is playing a lot better than what they did early in the year."
(Perspective on the Broden play? Surprised they took away the targeting penalty?)
With 1:33 to play in the second quarter, Arkansas receiver Tyrone Broden took a huge hit from LSU safety Sage Ryan that was initially called targeting but then the ruling was changed to no targeting after review.
"I was (surprised), yeah," Pittman said. "I was. I thought… Yeah, I thought it was a defenseless player. But they didn’t and they looked at it, but I thought it was."
Broden did go back into the game after that play.
(Got three hands-on-balls tonight, secondary has to make those plays?)
While Nussmeier didn't exactly light things up statistically, the Arkansas defense never forced mistakes and they allowed the Tigers to convert on 8-of-14 third downs.
"The one thing that stuck out to me was the third downs," Pittman said. "They’re jumping offsides and it’s 1st and 15 and we’re still not getting – you know they jumped off eight times and we’re still not getting off the field. I’ll give him credit, Nussmeier is throw the heck out of the ball but we – you know we were just way off of him and we tried to adjust they ran a stop-and-go on us. They’ve got good wideouts. We just have to get better from there."
(What did you think of Taylen and did you think he was 100%?)
Green suffered a bone bruise that forced him to exit in the fourth quarter of the Oct. 5 win over Tennessee, but a bye week in between then and the LSU game allowed Green to get healthy enough to play.
"I felt like he was close 100 percent because he practiced that way," Pittman said. "I think I saw him limping a little bit after he got his a couple of times. But, I think he went 21 or something on his GPS so you know I think he was ready to go, I don’t know if he was 100 percent, but he’s 90 at least. We’ll certainly take him at 90."
