Sam Pittman on establishing run game: ‘Certainly the plan’

Offense did not come easy for Arkansas last season. Firing offensive coordinator Dan Enos in Week 8 following a disappointing 7-3 loss to Mississippi State in a year that was the Razorbacks’ worst scoring the football since head coach Sam Pittman‘s first season at the helm.

The Razorbacks will look for an offensive reset this upcoming season, welcoming back Bobby Petrino to their staff as an offensive coordinator this time around. With Pittman addressing the team’s desire to specifically bring more physicality to their run game this year ahead of fall camp on Fayetteville.

“Certainly the plan,” Pittman said. “It was that way from when we went into the portal.”

Arkansas run game got decimated by the transfer portal this offseason, losing five of their top six rushers from last year to other schools. But some new faces in the backfield paired with a new offensive scheme under Petrino could turn things around for the Razorbacks on the ground.

“Bobby obviously likes to throw a lot of play action, well it’s not any good if you can’t threaten them with the run game,” Pittman explained. “I like all the schematics that we’re doing up front with our line, doing a lot of different other than just running full full zone type schemes.

“We’re doing a lot of different pin and kick out, pin and pulls, and off of that if we can run the football, which we felt like we had a good spring of physicality on both sides of the ball, then I think we can do the play action as well.”

The Razorbacks ranked second to last in the SEC with 326.5 yards per game last season and could definitely use some improvement both on the ground and through the air. Ideally with both elements of their offense helping one another out with a roster that Pittman feels confident about heading into the season.

“So we want to get back to that physical football,” Pittman said. “It’s hard to do if you don’t practice that way and if you don’t have the quite the kids ready at their position to do that. But I feel really good in our two deep in all our areas that we have, we’re a little thin at some places after that.”