FAYETTEVILLE — Arkansas’ defense has become downright offensive.

One only had to glance at the statistics after Arkansas’ 89-72 loss to No. 16 Vanderbilt to see a big problem.

The Razorbacks’ worst fears were realized — the Commodores, who Coach John Pelphrey called “unique” and “surgical” with their offensive attack, hit 65 percent of their shots in the first half and finished the game shooting 53 percent from the field.

Most were uncontested buckets. Even jumpers were wide open. It also didn’t help that, when challenged, A.J. Ogilvy muscled through and dominated the paint in the first half.

The result was a big loss, the Hogs’ third in a row.

The question is, what happened to the Razorbacks? They were a team challenging for the SEC Western Division championship and looked as if it had figured out how to guard the three-point arc. Their defense, along with Courtney Fortson’s return after a 14-game suspension, allowed the Hogs to string together five straight wins.

What happened to the team that contested shots in the paint?

Where’s the grit?

Get the latest Razorback news and views from Brandon Marcello on The Slophouse blog.

Where’s the pride?

Where is the defense?

Pelphrey pinpointed the weakness after the disheartening loss, the largest of the season at Bud Walton Arena. He wouldn’t pinpoint the exact reasons for the lackadaisical effort. Are the Hogs not finding their spots? Are they not rotating?

Or, as you can just see by looking at a roster, are they simply just not big enough on the wings?

Pelphrey responded, raising a few eyebrows.

“If I could really get it down that minute and I can figure it out, I'd probably already said that to our team,” he said. “Teams are playing better than us. That's the reality.”

Was Pelphrey being coy with the media or does he really not know? Either way, that quote will be printed, shared and picked apart by the fans.

And it happens when a team is on a losing streak. All the negatives are immediately magnified, perhaps without much reason. The fans clamor for significance, a lighthouse during a tumultuous storm.

“There’s the reason for our follies, our losses, our troubles,” the fans want to scream.

Is Arkansas losing its cohesiveness? Are there chemistry problems? Are the Hogs just wearing down mentally and physically from the grind in the SEC?

“We’re not pulling apart,” said sophomore guard Rotnei Clarke. “We’re sticking together. Nobody is pulling away from anybody else. We’re talking out there, we’re communicating.”

Maybe it is as simple as this — Arkansas is being out-played.

An eye test after the first few possessions of the game Saturday provided a result, one which wasn’t too off the mark when the game was finished two hours later. The Razorbacks were out-matched at all five positions on the floor. Vanderbilt had the size, the speed, the strength and the patience to carve these pigs until there was nothing left. The Commodores went ahead by as many as 27 points before Coach Kevin Stallings called off the dogs in his first win ever in Bud Walton Arena.

Stallings was well aware of his record in Fayetteville. He’s brought ranked teams into Fayetteville only to return to Nashville, Tenn., with a loss.

“If our teams had played like this a few more times, we might have gotten another victory or two,” said the coach who still hasn’t won in Starkville, Miss.

Stallings took it all in Saturday, high-fiving forward Jeffery Taylor during the post-game press conference, which capped a day that saw No. 2 Kentucky fall at Tennessee.

“I asked them if they’d get me off the schnide over here, and they did it,” Stallings said.

Stallings also had his own take on Arkansas’ three-game skid and lack of consistency, which was encapsulated with their 18-point first half in a 65-54 loss at LSU on Wednesday.

Maybe it’s because Michael Washington (sprained ankle) isn’t 100 percent? Maybe teams are preparing to defend Fortson a bit better? After all, his production has dropped during this skid and Saturday was the first game he didn’t reach double figures in his 15 starts this season.

Everyone has seemed to struggle. Marshawn Powell bounced back against Vanderbilt, scoring 21 of his game-high 27 points in the second half, but the Hogs haven’t been doing well with the jumpshot.

Clarke, who entered Saturday sixth nationally in three-point shooting percentage (44.8 percent), has hit just 6-of-24 three-pointers in the last two games, and looked as off as ever Saturday before hitting back-to-back treys in garbage time.

He finished 4-of-12 beyond the arc.

Fortson started 1-of-11 from the field and didn’t score in the first half.

The only thing left to do, Powell said, was to get back to practice and work.

Pelphrey believes the Hogs won’t have a problem doing that.

“I do believe that, without question,” he said. “This team has never shown any signs of being anything other than that.”

Even so, Arkansas still has questions to answer.

Brandon Marcello is the online sports editor for Northwest Arkansas Newspapers and the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. He updates The Slophouse, a blog covering the Razorbacks on WholeHogSports.com.