LITTLE ROCK — “I can tell you that issue was trying to use and have utility in an extra down.” Les Miles, LSU football coach, Oct. 4, 2010.
Saturday night, there was a problem with the final statistics from the Arkansas-Mississippi State game.
Little things didn’t add up, such as how the Bulldogs ran 100 plays and the Razorbacks had only 89 tackles, 85 of them unassisted, which might have been a world record.
Diligent, though, was the Bulldogs sports information department, and Sunday morning they released new official final stats.
The Hogs had 58 unassisted tackles and 64 assists.
Jerry Franklin - and those who follow wally like it is tweets got a early hint he was having a big game - went from 15 total tackles to 20.
Franklin, a junior from Marion and the son of Mary Franklin, was literally all over the field, and at the end of regulation had 17 tackles. As exhausted as he must have been, he made three more tackles in the two overtimes.
That total was seven more than his previous career high,which came last season against LSU.
Franklin had 87 tackles his freshman season, 94 as a sophomore and now has 90 with two games remaining.
Franklin is tied for seventh in the SEC for tackles this season, but none of the guys in front of him played against as many ranked teams.
Arkansas and Alabama have each played seven teams that were ranked at some time during this season. The Hogs and Tide are 5-2 in those games.
Franklin should be a candidate for first-team All-SEC.
“They didn’t play badly. It’s just that they played poorly at the wrong time.’” Miles, Oct. 3, 2008.
Knile Davis had a career high 187 yards against Mississippi State and has moved up to third on the SEC rushing list.
What almost went unnoticed was that Ryan Mallett had another great game.
The junior from Texarkana completed 17 of 26 passes for 305 yards and 3 touchdowns.
Last season, he set a school record for total yards with 3,624 and touchdowns with 30.
Mallett has passed for 3,272 yards and 27 touchdowns this season.
The 6,996 career yards leave him 426 short of tying Clint Stoerner for No. 1, and his 57 career touchdown passes tie him with Stoerner.
His 27 touchdown passes this season rank No. 2 behind his 30 last season.
Davis, from Missouri City, Texas, has 12 rushing touchdowns for the season, which tie for 11th with Bill Burnett in a season. Davis’ 1,031 yards are 14th-best for a season in school history.
Again, Davis and Mallett, barring injury, have two more games this season.
“We’re paid in a system where it’s reflective of capitalism and democracy that allows people to ascend.” Miles, July 23, 2008.
Saturday was the ninth time the Razorbacks have played in Starkville, Miss., and the atmosphere this time far exceeded any visit before.
The crowd was really into the game.
Yes, the cowbells can be annoying and they go right to the edge of breaking the SEC rules, but still, the Bulldog Nation was the best ever witnessed.
In fact, that crowd ranks up there with LSU or Arkansas (Razorback Stadium of late, and always War Memorial) for making it a hostile environment.
“There is a lot of enthusiasm and energy coming out of the building that I work in.” Miles, Oct. 18, 2010.
Sports, Pages 17 on 11/23/2010