What Mississippi State learned about Arkansas’ defense in its preparations for Saturday’s game was obvious in the Bulldogs’ first handful of offensive snaps.
Mike Leach, in his third year at Mississippi State, clearly thought his offense could run the football against the Razorbacks. He was right.
The Bulldogs’ run game, led by junior tailback Dillon Johnson, set the tone in 23rd-ranked Mississippi State’s 40-17 rout of the Razorbacks in Davis-Wade Stadium.
Arkansas dropped to 3-3 overall and 1-3 in the SEC ahead of a trip to No. 16 BYU next Saturday.
“They did a good job,” Arkansas linebacker Bumper Pool said. “We made some adjustments, tried to get our ends into some (4 inside) to help the ball bounce. But they had a good game plan. They came out running the ball right away and I just kind of felt we were on our heels from the jump.
“Credit them, they had some hard-running running backs, and their O-line played well.”
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Johnson rushed 17 times for 100 yards and scores in the first and third quarters, and junior running back Jo’quavious Marks added 52 yards and a touchdown on the ground. As a team, Mississippi State totaled 173 yards on the ground and very much looked the part of the tougher, more physical team.
The Bulldogs’ 173 rushing yards are a single-game high under Leach. The previous high was 151 yards in a 51-32 win over Missouri in December 2020.
“They've run the ball a lot (this season),” Pool said. “They kind of had some success, so they kept going with it, and then we made some adjustments. But we put ourselves in a hole too early on.”
Mississippi State opened with three consecutive run plays that netted 22 yards, and ran 6 times on its 9-play, 65-yard scoring drive. Johnson capped the series with a 1-yard touchdown run.
The Bulldogs finished with only a pair of runs greater than 10 yards in the win, but their 4.7-yard-per-carry average was more than enough to keep Arkansas off balance. They also found plenty of success running the ball on third and fourth down and keeping drives alive.
Arkansas gave up 58 rushing yards on Mississippi State’s seven third-down carries. Marks converted three fourth downs with the run.
The Razorbacks entered the weekend with the SEC’s No. 10 rushing defense, giving up an average of 142.8 yards per game. They allowed the No. 13 rushing offense in the league to nearly double its season average of 93.4 yards per game.
Pittman said he was not surprised that the Bulldogs turned to their run game for stretches. What did catch him a bit off guard, he said, is they ran the ball effectively without placing two backs in the backfield.
“That’s what they’ve been doing,” Pittman said of Mississippi State’s rushing success. “I mean, on 2- or 3-yard runs, we were ready to (say), ‘OK,’ but they were 7(-yard runs). We knew they ran so hard, but they ran over us. We couldn’t get (Johnson) on the ground.
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“That’s been a little bit of a problem this year, or a lot of a problem this year. We just have to continue to work it.”
The Razorbacks, who made 105 tackles in the loss, did not record a tackle for loss against the Bulldogs. It is the first time that has happened since Arkansas’ 56-3 loss at Auburn in 2016.
It is indicative of the freedom Mississippi State felt on the offensive side of the ball. It had the Razorbacks guessing after hurting them with the run early, then quarterback Will Rogers was able to exploit holes in the secondary for 395 passing yards and three touchdowns.
“We thought we had a good game plan going in, and really we couldn’t stop the run,” Pittman said. “They ran it basically when they wanted to. Part of that was they did a really good job.
“And part of it is we did a poor job of tackling.”