FAYETTEVILLE — The Arkansas defense stacked another strong day Thursday in the 10th practice of spring drills, a workout in shoulder pads and shorts in advance of Saturday’s practice at Reynolds Razorback Stadium, which will include some scrimmaging.
The session began inside Walker Pavilion for the first four periods, including fastball starts, with the temperature hovering in the high 30s, before it moved outside to the artificial turf as the morning warmed.
Defensive backs Jaylon Braxton, Jaheim Singletary, TJ Metcalf and Jaden Allen all recorded interceptions, with Braxton’s a sure return for a score as he caught it in the left flat from Jacolby Criswell during 7-on-7 work with clear sailing ahead of him. There were just as many dropped interceptions.
The top near-interception came during fastball starts, when linebacker Alex Sanford broke up a Criswell throw over the middle. The ball caromed well back toward the line of scrimmage and 380-pound defensive tackle Ian Geffrard nearly got his mitts around it before it hit the turf.
Defensive coordinator Travis Williams called the work great competition no matter the results.
“Our defense is doing some great things and Coach [Bobby] Petrino is doing a great job with our offense as well,” Williams said.
“With team, we did some good stuff. We’ll go back and watch the film. There are times where it may or may not be a sack and we continue to let it play, but our offense is doing some really, really good things.”
The defense exceeded their counterparts on the “good things” front on Thursday, with a large number of pass breakups, would-be sacks and tackles for loss.
Williams, who is having to replace almost every start in his linebacker corps, talked up transfer Xavian Sorey and young players Brad Spence, Carson Dean, Sanford and Kaden Henley, who are getting the top reps at the two spots.
“So what’s the fun thing about it is these guys are getting every rep to get better,” Williams said. “Sorey’s doing good. Dean’s doing good. Spence is doing good. Alex is doing good. Henley has come along. Henley’s done some good stuff at practice. And Brooks Both is another one.
“But adding Sorey has been really good for us. … He’s a guy that’s played a lot of ball. The other guys haven’t played because they were freshmen last year. They’re going into their sophomore year. The only reason people don’t know about them is they haven’t played. It doesn’t mean they’re not good enough. So it’s been good to kind of see those guys grow.”
Spence also takes some reps at the “Buck” spot ,which allows the Hogs to transition from a four-man front to a three-man front with a bigger body on the field. Defensive ends Nico Davillier and Landon Jackson also play the stand-up edge spot.
“Just trying to put some stress on the offenses we see,” Williams said to describe the front. “So we can go from four down to our three down Buck. We can stand Landon up, or whoever is at Buck, Nico. He’s at Buck as well. We can do some different things with the personnel we have to put stress on offenses.”
Williams said the defense has slowed its installation process, much like Petrino said the offense has done with five workouts left in spring.
During the 7-on-7 period, quarterbacks got out to a 4-for-5 start, including Taylen Green’s deep seam connection to Tyrone Broden, but the defense rebounded after that, holding the quarterbacks to 12-of-28 passing. Green finished 3 for 10, with completions to Isaac TeSlaa, Broden and Andreas Paaske. But he threw several balls well out of bounds aiming for targets down the right sideline.
Dean and Spence had breakups in the segment as did defensive backs Lorando Johnson, Akharki Johnson and Hudson Clark, who knocked away Green’s crossing route for Bryce Stephens at the last second.
The best play in 7 on 7 came from the third unit, as running back Cade Fields used all his speed to catch up to Criswell’s rollout deep pass and caught it with his fingertips for a long score.
The offense picked up substantially during red zone work, though it started with Metcalf’s interception against Green, who responded by completing his next three throws. The offense went 8 for 12 in red zone passing.
During fastball starts, Green found tight end Luke Hasz down a seam for a 30-plus yard completion and also completed a throw to TeSlaa.
Defensive back Aidan McCowan had two pass breakups against KJ Jackson with the third unit during fastballs.
Receivers Andrew Armstrong and Jaedon Wilson, both dealing with hamstring issues, went through individual drills but did not participate in team periods.
Stephens had his best workout of spring with a couple of tough catches on crossing routes as he comes back from an ankle problem.
Tailback Rashod Dubinion had the highest level of participation among the players in green no-contact jerseys. Tight end Ty Washington and linebacker Justin Logan, a freshman signee, also wore green. Defensive back Marquise Robinson did not participate and had a brace on his left knee on the sideline.
The top two kickers — Matthew Shipley and Vito Calvaruso — switched their performances from Tuesday’s work, when Calvaruso went 4 of 5 with the first group and Shipley was 0 for 3. Shipley worked with the top group Thursday and made 3 of 4, including a 55-yarder, while Calvaruso went 0 for 3 and Kyle Gallegos was 1 for 1.