HawgBeat - Can Arkansas turn close losses into wins?
When will Arkansas be able to turn close losses into wins? Razorback head coach Sam Pittman addresses that question.
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The Arkansas Razorbacks (2-4, 0-3 SEC) are looking at the very realistic possibility of a 2-5 start to year four of the Sam Pittman era, and close losses are continuing to stack up.
With Pittman as the head coach (since 2020), the Razorbacks are 5-12 in games decided by one possession. Those 12 losses include three of the last four games they've played, with Saturday's 27-20 loss at Ole Miss being the 12th.
In four of those 12 games, Arkansas held an outright lead in the fourth quarter. In three more of the 12 games, the score was tied at some point in the fourth quarter. That's at least seven of the 12 one-possession losses that you could argue Arkansas should have won, while the other five — such as the Liberty and LSU losses in 2022 — were also very winnable games.
"I think if you get beat in close games, you can pinpoint a little bit more of why and maybe try to fix it and things of that nature, but I'd rather play a close game than not," Pittman said after Saturday's loss to Ole Miss. "Ours tonight was just playing smart football. That's what it was. It wasn't anything else. I mean, that's what it was.
"As hard as it was up front on offense, if we just play smart, I just got to believe that one of those field goals would turn into a touchdown (and) you'd have a different ball game."
If Arkansas wants to take the next step as a program, these are games the Razorbacks have to win. Pittman currently has a 21-21 record as the head coach at Arkansas. Even if half of those 12 one-possession losses resulted in a win, that record changes to 27-15.
"I mean that group in there wants to win as bad as anybody in the state, as bad as we do and as bad as anybody does," Pittman said. "I think you could see it by the effort. I just told them we’re not playing smart.
"Even with the woes that we’re having running the football and protecting it, we had a chance to win the game if we play smart. And I really wish I could. I wish I could explain how you have zero (penalties) last week and then you have six false starts. I wish I could explain it but I can’t. But we’re damn sure going to keep on working to get it fixed."
At what point does "it wasn't a lack of effort" quit being an excuse? Losing so many close games eventually goes from a coincidence or bad luck to a negative trend that has some underlying reason for the same thing happening over and over.
"I think I worry about it more than the kids," Pittman said. "We’ve got good kids. They’re continuing to fight. You don’t fight if you don’t believe in something, if you don’t believe in the coaches or you don’t believe in each other or don’t believe you’re going to win. That’s when you stop fighting. I don’t think we’ll have that problem."
Pittman is right when he says this team has good players. The argument could be made that this is the most talented roster he's had since he's been in Fayetteville, but it hasn't resulted in wins on the field.
A year after fielding the worst pass defense of any FBS team, the Razorbacks now have a much-improved defensive unit led by first-year defensive coordinator Travis Williams. That side of the ball has done its job to keep the Hogs in games, but the offense led by first-year offensive coordinator Dan Enos isn't holding up its end of the bargain.
"Everybody’s got to fly their plane," safety Jayden Johnson said after the Ole Miss loss. "We can’t do everybody’s job. We can only do our job. What the offense has going on, we can’t let that affect us on the field."
The issues on offense start with the offensive line, which featured a new-look group to start the Ole Miss game, but transitioned back to the starting five we've seen most of the year in the second half.
Arkansas' 111.5 rushing yards per game ranks 112th in the nation and 13th in the SEC. The Hogs have given up 23 total sacks on the year, which is tied for 120th nationally and ranks 12th in the conference.
In Saturday's loss at Ole Miss the team ran for just 36 yards on 21 carries for a 1.2 yards per carry average. The last time Arkansas rushed for less than 50 yards was on Nov. 10, 2018, when the Hogs totaled 16 rushing yards on 19 carries in a 24-17 loss to LSU.
"I felt like we were going to run the ball a little bit better," Pittman said. "We don’t have to run the ball for 200 yards, but we gotta run for 100-something, to get people off the throwing game. But I really felt strong that we were going to have a really good defensive performance, even though I know Ole Miss is a really good football team.
"Ole Miss beat us and all that, give them the credit, but if we just play smarter football, we can go in there and celebrate instead of feel like this for the fourth week in a row."
Offensive line play and penalties have been two of the biggest factors for the Hogs in this four-game losing streak. In the BYU, LSU and Ole Miss losses, the Razorbacks were whistled for 35 combined penalties. The Texas A&M loss saw Arkansas go the entire length of the contest without a penalty, but the offensive line provided very little protection to result in a porous offensive output.
"We’re just putting ourselves in a hole all the time," Pittman said. "We’re not winning first downs. A gain of three would get us to second-and-7. We’ve been playing a lot of second-and-10, second-and-12, second-and-13. So I think that would help us with more drives, sustaining some drives.
"Obviously we haven’t been very good at scoring touchdowns in the red zone when we get down there. We got a big turnover Saturday (at Ole Miss), I think it was on the 38, and we kicked a field goal out of it. That would have been huge momentum for us if we would have went down and scored (a touchdown)."
With four straight losses in the rearview mirror and a meeting with Alabama in Tuscaloosa on deck, it would be really easy for this team to fold and give up on the season. The Head Hog thinks his squad can still turn things around with six games left on the schedule.
"We’ve just got to be more consistent," Pittman said. "We’ve got to help each other. In other words, when we go down and score, we take the lead, it’s time to get off the field and give us the ball back. We’ve just got to play better team football and be more consistent.
"We’re close. I know to the outside world it doesn’t look like we’ve got a very good football team, I think we do. We’ve just got to find a way in how to win at the end."
Arkansas will travel to Tuscaloosa, Alabama, on Saturday for an 11 a.m. CT kickoff at Bryant-Denny Stadium. The game will be televised nationally on ESPN.
