Arkansas Razorbacks cornerback Henre' Toliver said there was plenty of information exchanged on the field Thursday night against Florida A&M.
"The whole defense is out there communicating like crazy," Toliver said. "I'm talking about, we're overtalking out there."
The Razorbacks' defense not only talked the talk, but walked the walk as the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville opened the season by beating the Rattlers 49-7 at War Memorial Stadium in Little Rock.
It was a solid debut for the Razorbacks in their 3-4 defense and for new defensive coordinator Paul Rhoads, who coached the secondary last season.
"We're a confident group," Toliver said. "We just like playing for Paul Rhoads.
"We don't want to let him down, so we're out there playing urgent and busting our butts to the ball every play."
Arkansas held Florida A&M to 175 yards in total offense on 60 snaps, and 26 yards came when punter Chris Faddoul ran for a first down after a botched snap on fourth-and-2 early in the fourth quarter.
Faddoul's run gave Florida A&M a first down at the Razorbacks 42 and sparked what became a 15-play, 76-yard touchdown drive against Arkansas' backups.
Rattlers senior quarterback Vince Jefferies, who started in place of injured Ryan Stanley, hit Vince Norwood with a 7-yard touchdown pass.
"You always want to get a shutout, but they're hard to come by," said Arkansas sophomore inside linebacker De'Jon Harris, who had a team-high five tackles in his first start. "We tried to get one this game.
"We put the young bucks in and there was just a little bit of miscommunication that caused the touchdown."
No counting Faddoul's run, Florida A&M rushed 30 times for 69 yards.
That was an encouraging sign for the Razorbacks -- even against a Football Championship Subdivision team -- considering last season they allowed 205.5 rushing yards per game to finish 94th nationally.
Alcorn State, another FCS team, gained 313 yards against Arkansas last season and rushed 38 times for 155 yards.
"I don't care what level you're at, they had some good players, good athletes over there, to tackle as well as we did," Razorbacks Coach Bret Bielema said of the Rattlers. "We leveraged the ball really well. Turned it into pursuit."
Bielema said Toliver did an especially good job of forcing action inside on Florida A&M's first possession of the second half.
Outside linebacker Gabe Richardson forced a fumble by Florida A&M running back Hans Supre, Toliver recovered and returned it 18 yards for a touchdown to put the Razorbacks ahead 35-0.
"We call those type of fumbles country fumbles where nobody else else is around," Toliver said. "Scoop and score, so that's what I did."
Toliver was asked if there's such a thing as a "city" fumble?
"There's a city fumble and a country fumble," he said. "A city fumble is where a lot of people are around the ball and you just fall on it and give it to the offense."
Bigger challenges are ahead for the defense, starting a week from today against TCU, but the Razorbacks showed an ability to keep the Rattlers from getting outside for big gains as happened so often in games last season.
Arkansas outside linebackers Dwayne Eugene and Randy Ramsey each had sacks.
"Those Hogs and Razors are out there setting the edge like crazy, left and right," Toliver said using the names for the outside linebacker spots. "You have no defense without an edge. Last year showed that, and we're just trying to improve from last year."
Bielema said he was pleased with how Ramsey, a junior, and Eugene, a senior, played in new spots.
"Randy Ramsey and Dwayne Eugene have been kind of role players to this point," Bielema said. "I think it showed that those are two guys that belong at this level."
Sports on 09/02/2017