Arkansas football: 3 takeaways from epic comeback win against No. 17 Mississippi State

The Arkansas football team got a much needed conference win this week over Mississippi State 31-28.

The Razorbacks improve to 6-3 on the season while the Bulldogs fall to 5-4 on the season. This means the Hogs are likely to get a bowl invite, their first since 2016.

The Hogs were able to escape with the win after Mississippi State missed the game-tying field goal as time expired.

Let’s take a look at some key takeaways from this huge upset victory over Mississippi State.

1. Penalties are still an issue for this Arkansas football team

The Razorbacks committed 11 penalties, tied for second-most this season. The most they’ve committed in one game was 13 against Rice in Week 1 of the season.

Eight of the team’s penalties came in the first half and both the offense and defense were equally responsible for the errors (4 flags apiece).

Sam Pittman knows the penalties are an issue. Before heading into the locker room at halftime, he told ESPN they were only hurting themselves by committing so many errors.

“We’ve had 4 penalties on offense…4 penalties on defense— we’re killing ourself,” Pittman said on the sideline. “We’re keeping them in the ballgame. We gotta quit that in the second half.” #WPS #Razorbacks

And for the most part, they did. They only committed three penalties in the second half. Work still needs to be done to clean that up moving forward.