FAYETTEVILLE — Arkansas Coach John L. Smith said he didn’t know what to tell his team after the Razorbacks were blown out by No. 1 Alabama 52-0 on Saturday.
His quarterback did.
Tyler Wilson, who sat out with a head injury, addressed the team in the locker room then stalked into the interview room and delivered a terse message after the Razorbacks’ fourth-worst shutout loss in the program’s history.
“It wasn’t pretty to me to sit on the sideline and watch as a player,” Wilson said. “Do I feel that we at times gave up out there? Yeah, absolutely. As a leader, it sucks to see people not do their jobs and things go wrong. There’s been a lot of things go that way.”
Other Arkansas leaders tried to soften Wilson’s words.
“I don’t think it was quitting,” junior quarterback and receiver Brandon Mitchell said. “Sometimes you can look up there at the scoreboard and some guys know the game is over.”
Defensive captain Alfred Davis said Wilson expressed his thoughts to the team.
“I feel like we fought, we fought, we fought, it got out of hand and some guys did lighten up or loosen up,” Davis said.
“That’s about as bad as I can remember as a football team,” Smith said.
Arkansas’ upset hopes against the defending BCS champions were miniscule enough without Wilson, cornerback Tevin Mitchel and its top two fullbacks.
But when the Razorbacks (1-2, 0-1 SEC) imploded by dropping the ball on special teams and offense and throwing interceptions deep in their end of the field, they had no chance against the Crimson Tide in the rainy-day rout, the worst suffered by an Arkansas team in Fayetteville since a 63-7 loss in 1919 to Henry Kendall, which is now Tulsa.
Alabama (3-0, 1-0 SEC) dealt the Razorbacks their first shutout loss in Fayetteville since Arkansas lost 7-0 to Baylor in 1966 and their first shutout loss since a 28-0 loss to LSU at Baton Rouge in 1995. The Razorbacks committed five turnovers, forced none and compiled 137 total yards in losing their sixth consecutive game to the Tide.
Alabama Coach Nick Saban offered some words of solace for the reeling Razorbacks.
“I think everybody should have a tremendous amount of understanding for Arkansas’ circumstances,” Saban said. “Tyler Wilson is one of the best quarterbacks in the country, and the whole program is built around the guy. The whole team is built around the guy, in terms of what they do on offense, and they’re really good when he’s playing.
“They were really good last year. They were really good when he was playing this year, up until he got hurt.”
Arkansas lost three of its eight fumbles and Brandon Allen, who rotated at quarterback with Mitchell, threw two interceptions.
“You can’t beat a bad team, let alone the No. 1 team in the country, when you have eight fumbles,” offensive coordinator Paul Petrino said.
Alabama turned all five of its takeaways into touchdowns. The Crimson Tide also capitalized for the first score of the game when Will Coleman’s snap sailed over punter Dylan Breeding’s head, resulting in an illegal kick penalty on Breeding and Alabama possession at the Arkansas 6.
Eddie Lacy ran into the end zone on the next play for the first of his three touchdowns.
“Regardless of where they get the ball, we’ve got to keep them out of the end zone, and we didn’t do that,” Arkansas defensive coordinator Paul Haynes said.
In addition to the 6-yard touchdown drive, Alabama also had scoring drives of 3 yards, following Ha Ha Clinton Dix’s 46-yard interception return, 27 yards after Dennis Johnson’s fumbled kickoff return, and 28 yards after the second of Knile Davis’ two fumbles.
“We’re ripping and tugging at the ball and guys are trying to pull it out all the time,” Saban said.
Alabama also had longer drives, including a 15-play, 80-yarder on its way to a 438-137 edge in total yards.
The Crimson Tide secured their largest victory margin in a conference game since a 66-3 decision over Vanderbilt in 1979 and posted consecutive shutouts for the first time since 1980.
Wilson’s comments were a break from protocol for the Razorbacks, who typically do not allow injured players to speak. But Wilson told the UA media relations staff he wanted to talk to the media, though he took no questions.
The Razorbacks have scored 10 points, including a field goal in overtime, in six quarters since Wilson’s injury.
A big chunk of the announced crowd of 74,617 at Reynolds Razorback Stadium departed by the time Johnson fumbled away a kickoff early in the second half and Alabama scored its second touchdown in the first four minutes after halftime for a 38-0 lead.
Even Arkansas’ best offensive series malfunctioned.
The quarterback tandem of Allen and Mitchell guided a 51-yard drive to the Alabama 24 in the first quarter, but a high snap led to kicker Zach Hocker’s 41-yard field goal miss off the left upright in the driving rain.
A 33-yard drive to the Alabama 42 came to a halt when Allen threw an interception to Alabama safety Vinnie Sunseri.
A promising 58-yard series in the third quarter, on which Davis and the running game got going, came to naught when Davis was upended by Deion Belue on a dump pass from the Alabama 17 and fumbled back to the Crimson Tide.
And a last-ditch scoring effort led by Mitchell reached the Alabama 22 before Arkansas gave the ball up on downs.
Sports, Pages 23 on 09/16/2012