It’s must-win time for Sam Pittman and the Razorbacks as they travel to Starkville to take on Mississippi State.
Why is this a must-win? Well, the Hogs have to reach a bowl for Pittman to retain his job, and 6-6 could potentially not be enough. Louisiana Tech is still on the schedule, but there’s no realistic path to 7-5 without a win here, and even 6-6 would be tough, as it would require the Hogs to upset one of Ole Miss, Texas, or Missouri. Just as last year’s 7-3 loss to Mississippi State was the nail in Dan Enos’s coffin, it’s easy to see how Pittman could lose significant support with a loss on Saturday.
Speaking of 7-3, this game might be 7-3 after each team’s first drive. This game is going to give us a clue about whether Bobby Petrino was a good hire at offensive coordinator, because this is the type of game his unit is going to have to go win. Mississippi State’s defense is historic levels of awful, but if the Hogs can’t finish drives as they’ve struggled all year, State’s offense is good enough to beat them in a shootout. If Arkansas loses this game something like 28-24, then it will be clear that Petrino is going to save his boss’s job.
Over at Best of Arkansas Sports, I previewed the keys to this game in-depth. Be sure to check it out!
Meet the Bulldogs
Mississippi State has allowed at least 30 points to every FBS team they’ve faced, and that’s how they are 1-6 despite a rapidly-improving offense.
Jeff Lebby is in his first season after being hired away from Oklahoma, where he was offensive coordinator (Oklahoma’s offense has collapsed in his absence, and they just fired his replacement Seth Littrell this week). Lebby is the brother-in-law of Kendal Briles and runs an identical offense. Both are former Baylor assistants who mixed their scheme up with Lane Kiffin’s, which helps explain why former Arkansas offensive line coach Cody Kennedy bolted to Starkville when Hog fans turned against him. The hire was widely panned when it was made, as Lebby is sometimes perceived as too immature to run a major program.
I don’t know if this hire will work out or not, but I do know that Lebby’s first year is almost perfectly mirroring Chad Morris’s first season in Fayetteville. Consider:
- Week 1 blowout win over an FCS opponent with “Eastern” in the name (Arkansas 55-20 over Eastern Illinois, MSU 56-7 over Eastern Kentucky)
- Week 2 close road loss to a team out west (Arkansas 34-27 to Colorado State, MSU 30-23 to Arizona State)
- Week 3 home blowout loss to Group of Five school that’s sneaky-good (Arkansas 44-17 to North Texas, MSU 41-17 to Toledo)
- October strong performance off a bye against the SEC favorite that gives everyone hope even though the team is now 1-5 (Arkansas 65-31 to Alabama, MSU 41-31 to Georgia)
- Following week close home loss to go to 1-6 after everyone got excited and thought it was time for the breakthrough (Arkansas 37-33 to Ole Miss, MSU 34-24 to Texas A&M)
That’s… uncanny. Even the scores are somewhat similar in all cases.
Even crazier? The schedule lines up perfectly for State to finish off a Perfect Morris season:
- Disappointing home loss to an unranked team because the defense falls apart (Arkansas 45-31 to Vanderbilt, MSU this week against Arkansas)
- Ugly non-conference home win around Halloween against a very bad team (Arkansas 23-0 over Tulsa, MSU against UMass)
- Week 11 close loss to a team ranked 7th in the AP poll (Arkansas 24-17 to LSU, MSU against Tennessee)
- Week 12 blowout loss to a team ranked 21st in AP poll (Arkansas 52-6 against MSU, MSU against Missouri)
- Week 13 blowout loss in big rivalry game (Arkansas 38-0 against Missouri, MSU against Ole Miss)
Surely there’s no way they complete this, right? If they’re going to, then the mirror game is Arkansas’ 45-31 loss to Vanderbilt. The Hogs allowed 442 yards of offense, including 172 rushing yards to Ke’Shawn Vaughn.
The “defense falling apart” would be quite a sight to see, as Mississippi State’s defense seems to have already fallen apart.
When Arkansas has the ball
The Bulldog defense is bad at… everything.
That Havoc Rate of 124th is at the root of their issues. All four SEC teams the Hogs have faced this year are in the top 30 of Havoc Rate (percentage of plays that include a sack, TFL, forced fumble, interception, or pass breakup), so this is a welcome reprieve for the Razorback offense. State’s defense has just five sacks all year, fewest in the entire FBS. And Pro Football Focus has charted them with just 56 pressures all year, barely half of Arkansas’ total.
This defense disrupts nothing, and gets pushed around as a result. The average drive against them lasts 6.3 plays – 133rd of out of 134 FBS team – and covers 45 yards (130th). Most drives against them get into field goal range. They can’t knock opposing offenses off schedule (128th) or get off the field on third down (129th).
Their only shot this year has been turnovers. They picked off Carson Beck twice, allowing them to hang with Georgia for a bit. Then they forced a couple of Texas A&M fumbles last week to hang around there. If the Hogs don’t give the ball away, it’s hard to see how State stops them.
I think Arkansas needs to work on its early down offense in this game. The Hogs are just 96th in EPA+ per play on standard downs, and as a result, they spend a decent amount of time behind the chains (99th in Leverage Rate). They’ve bailed themselves out by being amazing on third down (7th), but that’s no way to make a living.
State’s defensive front is giving way run cushion like candy. They are 110th in forcing negative runs and just 120th in line yards (a measure of run cushion allowed). If you don’t fumble, you can find running room against them all day.
State’s pass defense is somehow worse than its run defense. The Bulldogs simply cannot pressure the quarterback or force incomplete passes. Florida’s two quarterbacks combined to complete 26 of 28 attempts against this defense, and State’s 72.5% completion percentage allowed is the worst in the entire FBS. State plays mostly zone (about 60-80% of snaps) and doesn’t really press much on the outside.
Arkansas’ passing game is massively improved just in the last few weeks. Heading into the Tennessee game, the Razorbacks were 94th in EPA/Pass and 109th in Passing Success Rate. Just two games later, they are sitting at 74th and 71st. And that’s come despite Taylen Green being pressured on more than 40% of his dropbacks in each of the last three games. State’s defense is only pressuring about 24% of dropbacks and hasn’t even managed 20% in any of its first four SEC games.
In short, everything is set up for Arkansas’ offense to have a monster game. Petrino offenses tend to be very difficult to stop if these three things are true:
- The quarterback is accurate
- The defense cannot get consistent pressure
- The defense cannot play press man against the receivers
On paper, all three of these things are true. This game sets up for the Hogs to really shred the Bulldogs through the air, and they should be able to run a bit too for good measure, even if Ja’Quinden Jackson is out.
When Mississippi State has the ball
Arkansas’ offense needs to turn its advantages on paper into real advantages… because Mississippi State is probably going to score some points.
The big concern here is that if Arkansas messes around and misses field goals, turns the ball over, and fails on fourth down around the edge of field goal range, the Bulldogs might have enough offense to win a medium-scoring game (think 28-24 kind of score).
The Lebby offense – which, again, is identical to the Kendal Briles offense – is quarterback-friendly because it keeps reads very simple for the quarterback. There are lots of RPOs and single read passes so the quarterback rarely has to work through complicated progressions. State’s offense has been able to throw the ball all year.
Original starter Blake Shapen, a Baylor transfer, tore his ACL against Florida and is out for the year. Things looked bleak at that point, but freshman Michael Van Buren has provided a nice spark. The competition has been very tough (his three starts have come against Texas, Georgia, and Texas A&M), but Van Buren has shown nice skill on downfield passes. Though he’s dual-threat, he hasn’t run much on either designed runs or scrambles, and he’s actually run himself into a few sacks.
The numbers on State’s run game aren’t amazing, but they’ve played better since Van Buren took over. They don’t get a lot of explosives (103rd in runs of 4+, 86th in runs of 10+), but they rarely go backwards (25th in runs of zero/loss). Cody Kennedy’s offensive line isn’t providing much cushion, so most of their success has come due to their running backs working after contact.
Arkansas should be able to contain this run game and force Mississippi State to move the ball mostly through the air. They won’t shut it down because the Hogs don’t create enough negative runs to do that (126th in stuffed run rate), but they don’t really need to.
Arkansas’ pass defense mostly focuses on containing the big pass plays, and they’re willing to give up some underneath completions in order to force the opponent to go on long drives. State needs those big plays: although they rank just 60th in explosive pass rate, that’s because an “explosive pass” is defined as a gain of 20+ yards, and State’s sweet spot is actually 15-19 yard gainers. Van Buren will throw a lot of incomplete passes, but he has the second-highest average depth of target in the SEC, with his average attempt traveling more than 12 yards past the line of scrimmage.
Unfortunately, he’s going to be without his top deep threat, freshman Mario Craver. I wrote about the implications of Craver being out for Best of Arkansas Sports, but Craver is averaging 22.2 yards per reception this season, including receptions of 72, 54, 46, and 45.
Without him, State has other options, with slot receiver Kevin Coleman as their top target this year. But Arkansas’ secondary now has the advantage on the outside, where top Hog corner Marquise Robinson can line up against Kelly Akharaiyi, and the Bulldogs don’t really have any other proven options on the outside to target Arkansas’ less-than-stellar rotation of Jaheim Singletary and Hudson Clark.
Keys to the game
Expect Arkansas’ defense to focus on taking away big pass plays and force Van Buren to string together several completions in order to move the football. State isn’t great on third down or in the red zone, and they’ll be down their top deep threat. I expect the Bulldogs to move the ball a bit on the ground and hit a few decent passes, but overall, I think Arkansas should keep them under 30 points and have a good chance to keep them in the low 20s.
Of course, if Mississippi State manages only 24 points, the Hogs will need more than that to win. They haven’t topped 24 points in any of their four SEC games. But those were against defenses that are orders of magnitude better than this one. If Arkansas continues to struggle with finishing drives, this could get interesting (and spark some unfortunate conversations about the job Petrino has done this year), but otherwise, Arkansas should be in position to simply outscore the Bulldogs.
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