When a team’s offense scores touchdowns on all 10 of its possessions, there’s a tendency to overlook the defense.
But the Arkansas defense was about as dominant as its offense in a season-opening 70-0 victory over Arkansas-Pine Bluff on Thursday at War Memorial Stadium in Little Rock.
An SEC team like Arkansas possesses obvious talent and depth advantages over a Football Championship Subdivision team like UAPB, but the Razorbacks held the Golden Lions to 130 yards in total offense on 46 plays, a 2.9-yard average.
“It’s hard to shut somebody out,” Arkansas coach Sam Pittman said. “I thought our defense did a great job with that.”
It was the first shutout for Arkansas since beating Tulsa 23-0 on Oct. 20, 2018, during the homecoming game in Fayetteville.
Yes, that was the first season of Chad Morris’ tenure in which the Razorbacks were 4-20 and 0-16 in SEC play.
But the Arkansas defense that kept Tulsa off the scoreboard six years ago included six future NFL players in linebackers Dre Greenlaw, De’Jon “Scoota” Harris, Randy Ramsey, linemen McTelvin Agim and Armon Watts and safety Kamren Curl.
That Tulsa team finished 3-9, but it scored at least 17 points in its other 11 games.
So a shutout remains notable regardless of the opponent or circumstances.
“It feels good, man,” Arkansas defensive tackle Eric Gregory, a sixth-year player, said of the shutout. “We haven’t had one of those in a minute. Just for that first game coming back, it feels pretty good.”
Second-year defensive coordinator Travis Williams worked from the sideline after calling plays from the press box last year.
“I think it was good,” Gregory said. “He brings a lot of energy. He can’t give that energy from upstairs through the headset.
“Him on the field just gives us the extra energy and telling us to lock in, focus. We have four quarters, not just one or two. So it was great having him on the sideline with us.”
Williams said during camp he had missed being on the sideline, where he coached on game day for his two seasons as defensive coordinator at Central Florida in 2021-22.
“(Last season) was my first time up in the booth,” Williams said during camp. “And you can kind of see everything. It’s calm. You don’t really hear the fans or anything so you can make calls, and that’s great.
“But I missed being in front of the players. If it’s a timeout, looking them in the eyes and getting things fixed or encouraging them, different things like that.”
Looking at the statistics, Arkansas didn’t appear to have much to fix on defense, but Gregory said that’s not the case.
“We left a lot of stuff on the field, too,” Gregory said. “We weren’t perfect. We’ve still got a lot to improve on.”
UAPB’s best drive was 8 plays for 29 yards when it reached the Arkansas 46 in the second quarter and wound up punting.
“I feel like everything we’ve worked for is paying off,” said Razorback defensive end Nico Davillier, a junior from Maumelle who made his first start and was a defensive captain along with Gregory. “We’ve got to get better at some things, but we had a good game.”
Arkansas held UAPB to 7 rushing yards on 23 carries.
The run defense was bolstered by the Razorbacks’ 10 tackles for 42 lost yards, including sacks by Gregory and linebackers Stephen Dix, Xavian Sorey and Bradley Shaw.
It was the fewest rushing yards for an Arkansas opponent in 10 seasons — the Razorbacks held Texas to 7 yards on 18 carries in a 31-7 win over the Longhorns at the Texas Bowl on Dec. 29, 2014, in Houston.
The lopsided score against UAPB allowed Arkansas to play its backups and third-teamers extensively. Twenty-one Razorbacks had at least one tackle. Davillier had five tackles to lead the team.
“The ones, the twos and threes that came in, I thought they played extremely hard,” Pittman said. “I wanted to keep that shutout.”
It was Arkansas’ first shutout in an opener since beating Missouri State 38-0 in 2000.
“I think it’s a real confidence booster for the young guys,” Gregory said. “Just to get that experience of playing and being a part of this. Not just seeing the ones do it or even the twos do it.”
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Publish date : 2024-08-30 20:05:00
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