FAYETTEVILLE -This much was evident Saturday at Walker Pavilion: A 74-play Bret Bielema scrimmage appears to be vastly different from what was done during the Bobby Petrino years.
More situational down-and-distance plays were scripted by Bielema and his staff for the full-contact work, and there was basically none of the loud, harsh corrections, often peppered with profanities, that was standard for Petrino.
“I had a coach that I really admired, who used to have something hanging on his wall: Praise loudly, criticize softy,’ ” Bielema said. “So I really try to follow that as much as I can. I want kids to know when I speak to them I want it to mean something. It’s not just motormouth or diarrhea of the mouth.”
Even as morning rain moved practice inside, the new staff’s emphasis on physical work by the lines was evident.
“We met in here this morning at 10 o’clock and I explained to them, ‘Hey, I want to play a physical style of football and it starts with today,’ ” Bielema said. “We’ve been building it, but we hadn’t pulled the pin and let everybody fly and run. Today was part of that and I was very, very happy offensively and defensively, the way that transpired.”
Top quarterbacks Brandon Allen and Brandon Mitchell each threw a touchdown pass. Allen, working with the starting offense, completed 11 of 19 passes for 137 yards by an unofficial count. His touchdown came on a second-and-2 deep ball to Javontee Herndon, who slipped past corner Tevin Mitchel and safety Eric Bennett for the 65-yard catch-and-run score down the right sideline.
Allen also lofted a deep ball into coverage that safety Rohan Gaines intercepted.
“I really like Brandon Allen,” Bielema said. “He threw a couple of deep balls today that I don’t want, but he has been throwing the deep ball very well. We don’t want to throw a prayer up there. We want to throw a completion.”
The unofficial tally on Mitchell was 7 of 14 for 112 yards, including a 4-yard touchdown pass to wide-opentight end Brad Taylor.
Mitchell’s score came during true “move the ball” work, a 75-yard drive on which the offense overcame consecutive false-start penalties by converting a firstand-20 on Mitchell’s 52-yard pass to Eric Hawkins to the 7.
“Brandon Mitchell’s got great presence with the team,” Bielema said. “The kids are into it.”
Mitchell’s group overcame four 5-yard penalties on the touchdown drive, and receiver Julian Horton came up big with a 14-yard catch on a second-and-15 and a 19-yard grab on a third-and-15.
Some minor injuries occured early. On the second play, wide receiver Demetrius Wilson went high to pull in a 10-yard pass from Allen. Cornerback Will Hines was there to take out Wilson’s legs, and Wilson’s helmet bounced off the turf on his fall. He didn’t return, nor did tight end Mitchell Loewen, who was rolled up on a runplay and left with an ankle injury.
Top tailbacks Jonathan Williams and Nate Holmes ran sparingly, with Williams rushing five times for 28 yards and Holmes gaining 21 yards on seven runs.
Walk-on Patrick Arinze, 5-10, 254 pounds, who enrolled during the second semester, had eight carries for 34 yards and showed power on inside runs.
The defense made its presence felt with Gaines’ interception, a high-impact forced fumble by linebacker Jarrett Lake on receiver Julian Horton that was recovered by Trey Flowers and multiple “sacks.” Deatrich Wise went high to slap down a pass at the line of scrimmage, and Ray Buchanan Jr. and Gaines also had breakups.
Horace Arkadie, Robert Thomas, Chris Smith, Wise, JaMichael Winston unofficially had sacks, and Darrell Kelly-Thomas and Taiwan Johnson had what appeared to be a combo sack.
Junior-college safety Tiquention Coleman registered a couple of loud stops, and defensive tackle DeMarcus Hodge had one of the day’s hardest hits with a stop of Arinze on which Arkadie assisted.
On the negative side, offensive players were called for at least seven false starts, an illegal formation and one holding penalty.
“There’s some things that happened before the snap that I wasn’t happy with today,” Bielema said. “Snap count and other issues, just lining up, and we had a big play come back because we had an illegal five men in the backfield.”
The illegal formation negated a Mitchell completion of 40 yards to Keon Hatcher on the series that ended with Taylor’s touchdown catch.
Horton led the receivers with five catches for 61 yards, while Herndon had two catches for 79 yards.
Scrimmage statistics
FAYETTEVILLE - Unofficial statistics from Arkansas’ scrimmage held Saturday at Walker Pavilion: SCORING PLAYS
Javontee Herndon 65 pass from Brandon Allen
Brad Taylor 4 pass from Brandon Mitchell RUSHING Patrick Arinze 8-34, Jonathan Williams 5-28, Nate Holmes 7-21, Jojo Wynn 3-11, Keante Minor 3-4, Alex Cacciarellia 1-0, Brandon Mitchell 3-(minus-4), A.J. Derby 3-(minus-6), Brandon Allen 2-(minus-13), Taylor Reed 1-(minus-2) PASSING Brandon Allen 11-19-1, 137 yards, 1 TD;
Brandon Mitchell 7-14-0, 112 yards, 1 TD; A.J. Derby 1-3-0, 10 yards; TaylorReed 0-1-0; Brian Buehner 0-1-0 RECEIVING Julian Horton 5-61; Javontee Herndon 2-79, TD; Eric Hawkins 2-61; Jonathan Williams 2-13; D’Arthur Cowan 1-10;
Jojo Wynn 1-10; Demetrius Wilson 1-8;
Keon Hatcher 1-6; Mekale McKay 1-5;
Brad Taylor 1-4, TD; Demetrius Dean 1-2;
Nate Holmes 1-0 DEFENSE INTERCEPTION Rohan Gaines FORCED FUMBLE Jarrett Lake FUMBLE RECOVERY Trey Flowers PASS BREAKUPS Deatrich Wise, Ray Buchanan Jr., Rohan Gaines SACKS-YDS Deatrich Wise 1-9, Robert Thomas 1-8, Horace Arkadie 1-5, Chris Smith 1-5, JaMichael Winston 1-2, Darrell Kelly-Thomas .5-4, Taiwan Johnson .
5-4
Sports, Pages 25 on 03/31/2013