The Arkansas Razorbacks played the sixth ranked Florida Gators this past weekend, and unfortunately it wasn’t pretty. The Hogs lost 63-35, and will look to play LSU this upcoming weekend.
The Arkansas football program has definitely taken a turn this year and is getting back on track to be a great program. Instead of being a laughing stock of the SEC with Vanderbilt, they are competing and winning SEC games. Its all thanks to Sam Pittman, and the culture he has brought to this team. He is recruiting at a high level, and has the team heading into the right direction.
Speaking of Sam Pittman, he was not able to coach this last game against Florida. Due to testing positive for COVID-19, coach Pittman had to it out of this game,. That led former Missouri head coach, and now Arkansas defensive coordinator Barry Odom to call the plays on the sideline.
While Barry did the best he could, the game did not go expected. Odom coached a great game, but in the end it just came down to which team had better talent. As many of you know, Florida is one of the best and most talented teams in the country.
There were some good moments throughout this game, as well as some bad ones. First lets go through who the losers were from this past week in a loss to the Florida Gators.
Arkansas Losers
Rakeem Boyd, RB
It is no secret that Rakeem Boyd has been struggling all year, and has not looked near as elite as last year. Boyd is missing his gaps, and does not look fully healthy this season. There are also times when he does not look as fast as he once was.
In this past game against the Gators, Boyd played bad to his standards. There was however, a play that he looked really good on. When he scored the touchdown, he showed a burst of energy and plowed over a few defenders. That is the Rakeem we are used to seeing, but that just wasn’t the case for the entire game.
Boyd finished with 12 carries for 56 yards, and had one touchdown on the play he looked great on. However, he had a fumble that was recovered for a touchdown. The razorbacks will need Boyd through these next few games. It is already bad enough that he is getting outplayed by the back up running back.
Hudson Clark, CB
Hudson Clark has had a story telling season thus far. The walk on red-shirt freshman is making a name for himself, and has even received a scholarship that starts in January. In his big game against the Ole Miss Rebels put him on the map. However, since then he has not played the best.
Hudson had a bad game against Texas A&M, where he blew a few coverages and even game up a touchdown or two. This week was much of the same story.
Clark gave up big play after big play against the Gators, which is something you cannot do against a team as explosive offensively as they are.
Clark had a blown coverage play on the Trevon Grimes touchdown, where it was a high low switch with him and Catalon, and Hudson Clark was the player in that situation that was supposed to switch.
Hudson was also beat deep on the Florida flea flicker, that ended costing Arkansas an eventual score. There were a couple of others as well, but lets not focus on the negatives too much. Hudson will have some more tough matchups this Saturday against LSU, that is if the game is played.