FAYETTEVILLE -- The University of Arkansas tried to pound the ball between the tackles against North Texas, and the Razorbacks tried to throw deep balls against press coverage.
Neither led to much success during the Hogs' 44-17 loss to the Mean Green on Saturday.
As a result, Arkansas Coach Chad Morris has pledged a less complicated game plan and he's turned the quarterback reins over to junior Ty Storey with the Razorbacks heading into their conference opener at Auburn at 6:30 p.m. Central on Saturday.
"As I mentioned to the staff, let's reduce and let's simplify and let's give clarity," Morris said Monday regarding the fresh offensive approach.
The Razorbacks are still seeking an identity on offense after wildly varying results, like 353 passing yards in the season opener against Eastern Illinois and just 80 rushing yards, then 299 rushing and 138 passing yards at Colorado State.
Neither the run nor the pass was dependable against North Texas, and the Hogs imploded with six interceptions to put pressure on their defense with a succession of short fields to defend.
The Razorbacks failed to create creases or blow double teams off the line of scrimmage in the run game, then gave up far too many pressures to quarterback Cole Kelley and reserves Connor Noland and John Stephen Jones.
Kelley also was out of sync with receivers for much of the day.
"Those are read plays for us when we're running that concept," offensive coordinator Joe Craddock said. "It's a read and the quarterback and receivers have to be on the same page. ... We've got to work on that in practice even more than we already do."
The lackluster offensive showing led to a season-low 336 total yards, 126 rushing yards, 5 sacks allowed and 44.4 percent completions.
It also led to the changes.
Morris has recognized lack of consistent quarterback play has hampered the offense.
"I think when you look back we've been talking about the quarterback since April and believe me, I want to settle on one," he said. "That's what I want to do and that's the direction we're trying to get to, but there's been the inconsistencies through that.
"Right, wrong and indifferent, it's not all on the quarterbacks, but that comes with that position. The one thing that I do know is ... offensive football. I know what it takes to be successful. I do know what it takes to score points and that's one of my messages as we go back in and go back to basics."
Auburn Coach Gus Malzahn did not disparage the early offensive struggles for Arkansas, which ranks 80th in total offense with 402 yards per game and tied for 6oth in scoring at 33 points per game.
"It's just like when I took over here," Malzahn said. "It takes you three, sometimes four games. I know it took us four games in 2013 before we settled in on personnel. We learned a lot about what we have and what we don't have and all that. I'm sure they're going through something similar to that.
"Chad's an excellent coach. He knows what he's doing and he'll get the best out of what he has."
Morris hopes the self-imposed reduction of the offensive concepts in the Hogs' arsenal will help the players hone in on execution.
"Going back to basics, what can we do?" Morris said.
The plan is to run fewer things but get good at the concepts that the Razorbacks can execute best.
"We're going to go back and simplify this thing and get these guys to know exactly what they're doing and give them the best chance to succeed as we possibly can," Craddock said.
Craddock explained that the Razorbacks used a lot of two tight end sets against North Texas and often set up two double teams at the point of attack in the run game.
"Unfortunately we didn't knock them off the ball the way we thought we could and we have to be better," Craddock said.
The Razorbacks are closer to being back to full power on the offensive line, with junior Colton Jackson likely in position to reclaim his starting job at left tackle from true freshman Noah Gatlin, who held up well in his two starts. Jackson's return would give Arkansas four veteran starters, along with Hjalte Froholdt, Johnny Gibson and Brian Wallace. Ty Clary started at left guard the last two games and might see time at center this week in a potential switch with Froholdt.
"We're running a lot more inside zone," tight end Jeremy Patton said. "It's more simple. I wouldn't even say basic because we are doing some different things. We've got some things in, but we are just narrowing it down a it. It's not that full plate.
"We have got some new passes. We have got some new running and some new things in protection, just as far as the broad spectrum of our play. That is what Coach Morris meant. We're narrowing it down to the plays that we think and really believe will have a positive effect against the defense that they've shown so far this weekend."
The Razorbacks' downfield passing was bad last week. Kelley completed 2 of 16 passes with 3 interceptions on passes of 15 or more yards against the Mean Green.
"We called a lot of those and we felt like we could run by their guys," Craddock said. "Jordan Jones did get by one of their corners and unfortunately we had a little wind behind us and the ball sailed out of bounds. We thought we could run by their guys and we wanted to take some shots to loosen them up.
"Their safeties were playing incredibly low and giving us man coverage, so we felt coming into the game if that's what they were going to give us then we were going to take some shots."
Freshman Mike Woods caught a 25-yard back-shoulder throw to set up a second quarter touchdown and also had an 18-yard grab in the period that led to a missed field goal. Otherwise, the Razorbacks could not make deep connections, and often times Kelley was delivering the ball to spots while the receivers were heading elsewhere.
"You can see the inconsistency in a lot of areas," Morris said. "The timing with the quarterbacks and the wide receivers, you saw a little bit of that the other day."
Storey did not play in the North Texas loss, but Morris thinks he'll be prepared to operate the game plan at Auburn.
"Understanding what they do defensively, getting us in the right protections and getting us in the right calls and go play," Morris said of what he expects from Storey.
"If it's only four things that we can do, then let's just get good at those four things. Maybe we're not ready to have... Maybe we only get 10 percent of the offense in this year. Then let's be very effective with 10 percent of that offense we get in."
Sports on 09/21/2018