FAYETTEVILLE -- The University of Arkansas conducted practice No. 2 of training camp Wednesday afternoon with a high temperature of 88 degrees on another tempo-pushing day.
One media member from each outlet was allowed to observe a 15-minute window early during the workout after undergoing a short health checklist and temperature scan. Face masks were required. It was the first media viewing window allowed under first-year Coach Sam Pittman.
Junior wide receiver Mike Woods and junior cornerback Montaric Brown engaged in a video conference after the two-hour workout.
"The tempo is definitely up there," Woods said. "This offense moves fast. It's like the receivers, we already know after this play ends, we've got to get back up to the line for the next play. So the tempo is as expected. They told us we were gonna go fast, and it's going fast."
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Brown said the weather hasn't been an issue, even though the heat was reflecting off the artificial turf where the defense worked and created temperatures pushing into the 90s.
"The weather's been fine," Brown said. "We're just preparing. It's going to be hot during the season, so Coach [Sam Pittman] has us outside during the season in the heat."
Woods said he had three touchdown receptions from first-team quarterback Feleipe Franks during various 7-on-7, group-and-team drills, and that Treylon Burks, T.J. Hammonds and Peyton Ausley all had scoring catches, among others.
Brown, who has had interceptions each of the first two practices, said the defensive backs had an array of picks Wednesday.
"Our defensive backs are performing excellent," he said. "We got a couple of picks ourselves. We had a lot of young guys step up, like Greg Brooks, and Jerry Jacobs had a couple of picks with me and a couple more people."
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Franks, wearing a left knee brace, worked at the head of his group and showed a big arm with a tight spiral on virtually all of his passes.
On a bootleg pass to his left, true freshman Malik Hornsby threw a dart while on the move, an indication his arm is plenty strong.
Practice was conducted without music blaring from speakers, as was the case under Bret Bielema and Chad Morris the past several years.
Strength and conditioning coach Jamil Walker, wearing combat boots, and director of player development Fernando Velasco walked the perimeter of the practice fields during the early media viewing portion of practice.
Catalon out
Redshirt freshman defensive back Jalen Catalon is going to miss practice time after having a procedure to repair a meniscus in a knee, sources told the Democrat-Gazette.
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Catalon is expected to miss about four weeks after the procedure. The 5-10, 189-pounder from Mansfield, Texas, was one of the top signees in the Razorbacks' 2019 signing class. He is expected to compete for playing time at safety.
Catalon had major knee surgery as a prep senior at Mansfield Legacy High. He needed shoulder surgery late in his redshirt season at Arkansas last year.
Nice grab
Redshirt freshman Shamar Nash made one of the best catches during the 15-minute viewing window for the media.
Nash, running a deep crossing route left to right, reached back over his right shoulder and hauled in a pass from a quarterback who was blocked from view.
Roster notes
Senior T.J. Hammonds, still wearing jersey No. 41, worked with the wide receiver group Monday, perhaps a signal the new coaching staff is OK with its running back depth and looking for depth in the slot.
Defensive backs Jarques McClellion and Jalen Catalon, receivers Trey Knox and Tyson Morris, and offensive lineman Chibueze Nwanna were among the players not spotted at Wednesday's workout.
However, the 15-minute window makes a precise roster check difficult, and media members were stationed in 6-foot segments along the ends of the practice fields, sometime a long distance away from where group drills were being staged. In particular, the linebackers and receivers were stationed at the far end of the field and difficult to see.
With McClellion not in attendance, the top rank of corners were Montaric Brown, LaDarrius Bishop, Greg Brooks Jr. and Devin Bush.
O-line look
Sophomore Ricky Stromberg was taking snaps at center, flanked by guards Shane Clenin and Beaux Limmer, as the offensive line worked in inside and outside groups during the media viewing window. Two-year starting center Ty Clary was working at center with a unit that had Luke Jones at left guard and Ryan Winkel at right guard during the drill.
Returning starters Myron Cunningham and Dalton Wagner looked to be at the top tackle spots, with Cunningham backed by some combination of Brady Latham, Dylan Rathcke and Marcus Henderson, and Wagner supported by Noah Gatlin and Ray Curry Jr.
Done wrong
Arkansas and Missouri got the toughest two-team draws when the SEC office assigned the two extra games for each league school once officials decided to play a conference-only schedule.
The Razorbacks were assigned Georgia and Florida, the top two contenders in the SEC East, who are ranked No. 4 and No. 8, respectively, in the preseason USA Today coaches poll.
Missouri drew preseason No. 3 Alabama and No. 5 LSU, the defending SEC and College Football Playoff champion.
AL.com ranked Arkansas' schedule the toughest in the SEC, with Missouri checking in just behind the Hogs.
"Overall, Arkansas got the rough end of it because they're going to have to play Florida and Georgia ... and that's going to be really tough," new SEC Network analyst Roman Harper said on Monday's schedule reveal show.
Why go on?
SEC Commissioner Greg Sankey was asked Monday evening by SEC Network anchor Dari Nowkhah why the conference elected to push on toward a football season after the Big Ten and Pac-12 opted to drop its fall football schedule.
"There are reasons that each conference has offered for its decision making," Sankey said. "You look at the Pac-12's announcement, almost a week ago, about local conditions and testing challenges and then about the work to understand the health realities around covid. We've worked on those same issues.
"We are working to secure a third-party entity to help support our testing program and have common testing across all 14 programs. That's obviously not inexpensive, but that's our commitment to support student-athletes. We want to see improving health within our communities. The trend lines have been better the last few days, perhaps over the last week. But as our campuses return, that's been an incredibly important part of our decision-making process and that needs to be done in a healthy manner. I'm concerned over some of the images I saw over the weekend, whether that will allow us to play football. That has to be on everyone's mind.
"We intentionally set our schedule to begin well after our classes started across the conference, to allow people to come back and assimilate, we hope into a campus community in a healthy way and then move forward with college football."