FAYETTEVILLE — For the third straight season, Arkansas left Ole Miss coach Hugh Freeze and his players shaking their heads at the conclusion of their football game.
Quarterback Austin Allen led the No. 22 Razorbacks on a 10-play, 56-yard drive that was capped by Jared Cornelius’ 6-yard touchdown run with 2:20 left.
It was the third straight year the No. 12 Rebels (3-3, 1-2 SEC) had lost to the Razorbacks (5-2, 1-2). Arkansas won 53-52 in overtime last season and 30-0 two years ago.
“Obviously, it was really disappointing to not get it done tonight,” Freeze said. “I thought our defense gave them cheap scores early on, which was very frustrating.
“It’s certainly things that we worked on and felt like our kids had an understanding of, but they didn’t. We got that fixed and I thought our defense played well the second half and gave our offense chances to take control of the game, but we didn’t do that for a variety of reasons whether it was a poor call, poor protection or uncharacteristically critical drops that really changed the last two possessions, where we had chances to, one, take control of the game, and two, to go down and win it.
“Those were critical and really hurt and is something that we haven’t done a lot of this year. It stings, it hurts, give credit to them, but we certainly leave here feeling like we let one get away.”
After Arkansas’ go-ahead score, the Rebels soon found themselves with fourth-and-16 on their own 20.
Unlike the Razorbacks’ conversion of a fourth-and-25 last year in overtime, Rebels quarterback Chad Kelly was unable to find an open receiver and took off running.
Kelly (18-of-39 for 253 yards passing, 14 carries for 88 yards rushing) was met violently by Arkansas safety Santos Ramirez at the 29, and fumbled the ball out of bounds after picking up nine yards. He seemed to not realize it was fourth down.
“I (saw tight end Evan Engram) off to the left and he had beat him in press coverage and then he fell down and the safety rolled and a guy was behind me,” Kelly said. “I did a little twist and seen a hole and I took off and tried to make a play. I have to protect the ball and slide or do something instead of trying to take a hit and getting a first down.”
Engram (7 catches, 111 yards, 1 touchdown) hurt his shoulder during the game, but played through it.
“That doesn’t matter,” Engram said. “We needed this win tonight. I don’t care about (the injury). I just wanted to show up and make plays for my team. I just couldn’t get it done there when I had to.”
Ole Miss defensive coordinator Dave Wommack, an Arkansas assistant from 2001-04, was impressed with what he saw from the home team’s signal caller on Saturday.
Allen completed 19 of 32 passes for 229 yards with 3 touchdown passes. He was sacked three times and threw an interception.
“I have been impressed by Austin ever since I saw him on film,” Wommack said. “I thought he would be a little inexperienced because he doesn't have the reps, but he makes plays when he has to make plays.
“I was impressed with him after Texas A&M, I was impressed with him against Alabama and doing what he had to do. If they could have run the ball successfully against Alabama, they could have beat them, too.
“I think they have themselves a very good quarterback.”
Arkansas sophomore tailback Rawleigh Williams rushed 27 times for a career-high 180 yards.
That rush yardage and the final drive were both frustrating to Ole Miss defensive end Marquis Haynes, who had five tackles, a sack and an interception that he returned for 17 yards.
“Sometimes we just overshoot our gaps and it is sometimes just the effort we are playing with,” Hayes said. “We are out there having fun and stuff but sometimes we are just playing too hard and overshoot where we are supposed to be.”
Kelly, whose team was out gained 429-403 in total offense, didn’t think it was as much about what Arkansas did as it was what Ole Miss didn’t do.
“They were giving us what we wanted, we just had to beat their press coverage and make throws and everybody has to be on the same page as well,” Kelly said. “We can’t turn the ball over. I think they scored off of that. We have just got to get better and be on the same page.”
Freeze echoed that sentiment.
“They are who they are and we felt that our tempo was giving them problems - especially when we went empty (backfield) - and had some one-on-ones that our guys could win as they did many times,” Freeze said. “We had a few bad throws, we had some drops, some poor calls and we probably should have stuck to the running game more.
"They didn’t do anything different other than maybe play some more man than what is typical for them.”