HawgBeat - Big offensive weekend a sign of late-season turnaround for Arkansas?
Is the Arkansas baseball team close to flipping its offensive reputation after a big weekend?
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Arkansas' offense has been the talk of the town in recent weeks. No, not because of towering moonshots or multi-run comebacks, but because an offense helmed by hitting coach Nate Thompson has seemingly made a personality change for the majority of the 2023-24 campaign.
But following a weekend that saw the Diamond Hogs defeat No. 14 Mississippi State behind 21 total runs, the question remains: is Arkansas about to make a huge late-season turnaround at the plate?
Needing a series win to feel good about its super-regional hosting chances as the regular season comes to a close, the Razorbacks hoped for a scoring outburst in a key rubber match against the Bulldogs on Sunday.
"I’ve been telling them and pleading with them to ‘Hey, just let me write the same lineup down. Just go out and show me that you need to play against right or left or whoever. Swing the bats and be tough outs,' head coach Dave Van Horn said on Sunday. "They did it all weekend. It was really good to see.
"I know we only got eight hits. We hit a couple of balls hard but we hit three home runs on a day that you needed to hit it to dead left on over to get it out of the park with the wind, the way it was blowing. So, yeah, definitely, definitely a good weekend for our offense."
After trailing 6-0 to Mississippi State, Arkansas clawed back within three after a two-run bomb by Jayson Jones before tying things up on a red-hot Hudson White two-run blast in the sixth.
“Like I said the other night, it felt like I was fighting myself all year, mechanically," White said on Sunday. "I felt like there was some certain things that didn’t allow me to get to that power. But coach (Nate) Thompson has done a great job. He’s really helped me out. We know we’re starting to get it figured out.”
The Texas Tech transfer finished the weekend 5-for-12 at the plate with six RBIs and is a big reason why this Razorbacks' offense is ready to take a jump.
"His swing’s so much freer," Van Horn said. "I don’t know. We talked about it three weeks, ‘You haven’t hit a home run, the ball’s not jumping off your bat.’ We felt like he had his hands too far back. You’ve got to relax your hands to get more whip. I could go through hitting terminology, but he just seemed a little stiff. I know Coach (Thompson) and him have worked a lot. It just seemed so much looser and freer and quicker now."
There's no question that this hasn't been the season many expected from Arkansas' offense. Sure, players like Peyton Stovall and Peyton Holt have mashed the baseball against opposing pitchers, but the squad as a whole hasn't lived up to the "Sooieville Slugger" nickname earned by previous teams.
Timely hitting, sacrifices and luck have been good enough to give the Hogs an impressive 42-10 (19-8 SEC) overall record, but that alone won't be enough once the postseason starts.
After taking two-of-three against Mississippi State, Arkansas has a team batting average of .271 with 70 homeruns. Those aren't eye-popping numbers for a team looking to make a run towards the national championship in Omaha, but this weekend offers a glimpse of what could be if the Hogs get hot.
If you ask Van Horn and the rest of the team, they're only scratching the surface of their potential.
"I think that they believe they're a pretty good team," Van Horn said. "I think that our team feels like that we’re better than what we’ve played a lot of times. We’ve still won a lot of games. You look at the numbers and you’re going, man, they don’t hit. They don’t hit, and our guys are like, we are better hitters than this. So, I just feel like they don't feel like they're out of the game, and a win like this can really help that."
Up next, the Razorbacks will travel to Arlington, Texas, for a matchup against Texas A&M that starts on Thursday. First pitch is set for 7 p.m. CT and it will broadcast on ESPN2.
