Arkansas Sports 360 - ArkansasSports360.com

9/11/2010 at 10:34pm

Image by Mark Wagner

Arkansas wide receiver Greg Childs dives for a touchdown in a 31-7 victory against Louisiana-Monroe. Childs had 12 catches for 146 yards and 2 touchdowns.

ARKANSAS 31, ULM 7
WHY ARKANSAS WON
Defense. No, seriously. Arkansas was off much of the night offensively, but the Razorbacks were good enough on defense that they managed to hold ULM scoreless until the fourth quarter. Arkansas held the Warhawks to 188 yards of total offense and 3 of 14 on third down conversions. 

GAMEBREAKER
Louisiana-Monroe was determined to stack the box and blitz against Arkansas. That often left one-on-one coverage in the secondary, something Greg Childs excels against. Childs caught 12 passes for 146 yards and a pair of touchdowns. His first-quarter touchdown went for 19 yards and pushed the Razorbacks up 7-0, while his 18-yarder in the fourth quarter gave Arkansas a 24-0 advantage.

MALLETT WATCH
ULM sacked Ryan Mallett twice. They sent him to the ground more often than that and forced him into a first-half fumble. Mallett overthrew receivers in the first half and led the Arkansas offense to only seven first-half points.

Awful night, right? Hardly.

Mallett completed 65 percent (28 of 43) of his passes. He threw for 400 yards and three touchdowns while being intercepted once.

Arkansas scored 24 points in the second half as Mallett completed 16 of 20 passes (80 percent) after halftime.

Hard to find fault with that.

THERE THEY ARE
Turnovers were a big part of what little success the Razorback defense had in 2009, so it was surprising that Arkansas didn’t force a single one in the opener. That changed on Saturday against Louisiana-Monroe.

Arkansas forced two turnovers, both in the third quarter. Rudell Crim had an interception and Jake Bequette recovered a fumble.

FOURTH DOWN
Why did the Razorbacks go for it on four fourth-downs? No faith in the punter? No faith in the kicking game? Too much faith in the offense?

None of the above?

It was really just a matter of strange field position. Arkansas was often too close to the end zone to punt, but too far away to attempt a field goal.

That led to the Razorbacks going 1 of 4 on fourth downs. Not to worry, though. Kicker Zach Hocker got close enough for a 26-yard field goal and Dylan Breeding punted twice, including one that was downed at the ULM 1.

NO MORE PUNT CATCHER?
Punt returns have not been strength for Arkansas for a while. The struggles predate Petrino, but might be close to ending.

Joe Adams had 82 return yards on five attempts. That’s an average of 16.4 yards per return and he had a long of 19 yards. Adams also had three receptions for 47 yards.

REMEMBER HIM?
What Arkansas fan could forget Marc Curles? Yeah, the official who called a couple of questionable penalties against Arkansas in last year’s 23-20 Florida loss and was suspended along with his crew.

Well, Curles was back for his first Razorback game since last year’s incident. Officials flagged Arkansas six times for 46 yards. None seemed to be the sort that could lead to a suspension.

QUOTABLE
“Offensively, sometimes you have to wear them out. I get the feeling sometimes with our offense that they think they can just go out and everything good is going to happen right away. You just have to wear them out.”
—Arkansas Coach Bobby Petrino

UP NEXT
Arkansas (2-0) travels to face Georgia (1-1) in Athens, Ga. Georgia held off the Razorbacks for a 52-41 victory in 2009. Kickoff is scheduled for 11 a.m. CDT.

Tagged: Louisiana-Monroe War Hawks, Ryan Mallett, Bobby Petrino, Arkansas Razorbacks