It’s Alabama week. We can go back through the numbers, but they are grim: Arkansas hasn’t beaten Alabama since 2006, and they haven’t beaten a Nick Saban-coached team since 2002. And both of those victories were incredibly fluky: the 2006 game was the Leigh Tiffin game, where Alabama’s kicker missed three field goals and an extra point in a 24-23 Hog win, and the 2002 game was the Miracle on Markham.
That losing streak will eventually end (though it is entirely possible that the Saban one will not before he retires), but this isn’t looking like the year. Arkansas is once again in chaos, and Alabama appears to be rounding into form following a 26-20 road win over a hyped-up Texas A&M team. Alabama’s defense is vintage (3rd in our model) and is a bad matchup for Arkansas due to its ability to inflict negative plays, so we are legitimately on shutout watch. I sort of suspect that Arkansas will play hard and won’t get embarrassed, but this is a game where the biggest thing is to not get anyone hurt.
So this game will have minimal impact on our perception of the season. After the Alabama game, four of the remaining five games are projected to be within a touchdown, and two of them are total toss-ups. Here are the predicted final scores for Arkansas’ six remaining games as of this week:
- Alabama 26, Arkansas 16
- Arkansas 27, Mississippi State 20
- Florida 26, Arkansas 19
- Arkansas 22, Auburn 22
- Arkansas 28, FIU 20
- Mizzou 24, Arkansas 23
Our model assumes a 3-point swing for the home team, so Auburn (23-20) and Mizzou (26-22) would be clearer losses on a neutral field.
If Arkansas improves by about 2 points per game, they can get to 6-6 with wins over State, Auburn, FIU, and Mizzou. The big one, as you can see, is the State game. Obviously a loss would drop the Hogs to 2-6, but you simply cannot lose that game. State is in an identical position to Arkansas; they changed offensive schemes ahead of their star quarterback’s senior year and he’s regressed badly. The difference is that State has less total team talent than Arkansas, and the game is at home. The Bulldogs rank 117th out of 133 FBS teams in our model, worst in the SEC. I don’t think it’s overly dramatic to declare that if Arkansas loses that game, the Pittman era is over. It’s the definition of a must-win. Win that one, and the schedule presents the opportunity to climb out of this hole and even make a bowl.
Other Games to Watch
We’ve got a long list of games to watch this week. Please do not take the second list too seriously; it is just for fun.
SEC Games
Texas A&M at Tennessee (2:30 pm, CBS). Both teams really need this game. Tennessee’s offense has been pedestrian all year, and with Georgia and Alabama still on the schedule, the Vols would rather not take a second loss so quickly. Texas A&M had its chances and blew them against Alabama, and their reward is a difficult road game where a loss not only ends their SEC West title hopes but puts them at high risk for an 8-4 season. The Aggies are paying Jimbo Fisher a lot of money for a season like that.
Florida at South Carolina (2:30 pm, SEC Network). Florida’s games after this one: Georgia, Arkansas, LSU, Mizzou, Florida State. It’s fair to ask if the Gators drop this one: are they going to make a bowl? Our models like them a lot more than the eye test does.
Auburn at LSU (6 pm, ESPN). The completely stoppable force that is Auburn’s offense meets the extremely movable object that is LSU’s defense. With two losses already and Alabama and Texas A&M still to go, the heat will turn up on Brian Kelly if the Tigers drop this one.
Mizzou at Kentucky (6:30 pm, SEC Network). Both teams took crushing losses last week – Kentucky in a blowout against Georgia, Mizzou is a close home loss to LSU – so who bounces back? Winner becomes bowl eligible, and Mizzou might can still make a claim for second place in the SEC East.
Coach Watch
If you’ve given up on the current Arkansas regime, it’s hard to blame you. But hope springs eternal, so you’d probably rather watch potential Razorback coaching candidates in action. After all, no one wants to get into Flight Tracking Season and realize they don’t actually know anything about the top candidates. Here are some options for you, as several of them have very big games this week.
Liberty at Jacksonville State (Tuesday, 6:30 pm, ESPNU). You may remember Jamey Chadwell, who was the interim coach at Coastal Carolina in 2017 when the Chanticleers came to Fayetteville and nearly beat the Hogs, who were saved in what can only be called The TJ Hammonds Game. Chadwell eventually got the full-time gig and had a pair of 11-win seasons for Coastal, and now has Liberty 5-0 in his first season. The Gamecocks of Jacksonville State are 5-1 in their first FBS season, so this should be a good matchup.
Tulane at Memphis (Friday, 6 pm, ESPN). Willie Fritz was widely thought of as a candidate for the job back in 2020, and for good reason. Since that time, he’s added a New Year’s Six bowl to his resume (the Green Wave took down USC in the Cotton Bowl last year). He’s 63, but he’s been a winner at every stop: two FCS title game appearances at Sam Houston, an 8-0 Sun Belt record in Georgia Southern’s second season in the FBS, and now 16-3 in the last two seasons at Tulane. The winner of this game is probably the American favorite.
Indiana at Michigan (Saturday, 11 am, FOX). Watch Michigan to check out their defense, which ranks #1 in our model. Defensive coordinator Jesse Minter was in fact born in Little Rock, though his connections to the Natural State are minimal, as he did not grow up here (he grew up in Indiana). His father Rick was a GA for Lou Holtz at Arkansas in 1978. Anyway, Minter spent four years on John Harbaugh’s Ravens staff and has coordinated the Wolverine defense since 2022. Would be actually be a candidate? No idea, but I like watching good football, and Michigan plays good football.
Kansas at Oklahoma State (Saturday, 2:30 pm, FS1). The obvious first call for the Hogs should there be a coaching search would be Lance Leipold, a guy who just wins. He went 109-6 as the head coach of Division III Wisconsin-Whitewater, winning six national titles in eight seasons. Buffalo gave him a chance at the FBS level, and he delivered MAC East titles in his fourth and sixth seasons at the helm. Now at Kansas, he took over the Power 5’s most moribund program and quickly went from 2-10 to 6-7 to 5-1 this year. A win over Oklahoma State would ensure the Jayhawks bowl eligibility for the second straight year.
UNLV at Nevada (Saturday, 4 pm). I doubt Barry Odom would be a serious candidate unless top options all said no, but the work he’s doing in Las Vegas is impressive. The Rebels are 4-1 after more than a decade of bad football (UNLV hasn’t been good since they beat Arkansas in 2000 Las Vegas Bowl). Odom’s defense is massively improved, but all eyes are on his innovative offensive coordinator, Brennan Marion, whose “GoGo offense” has been really influential in coaching circles in the last few years. Marion, just 36, is almost certainly going to get a Power 5 offensive coordinator job this offseason. I tend to think that Marion’s scheme is exactly what Arkansas needs to succeed, so I’ve been following the Rebels closely all year. A retained Sam Pittman could look to Marion to replace Dan Enos, or Odom, if hired, could try to lure him to Fayetteville.
UL Monroe at Texas State (Saturday, 6 pm, ESPN+). Deion Sanders’ total rebuild at Colorado is getting all the attention, but new head coach GJ Kinne did the same thing at Texas State, bringing in an army of transfers to transform a program. Kinne, a former Tulsa quarterback under Gus Malzahn, is just 34 years old, but his rebuilt Bobcat squad stunned Baylor in his first game as coach and are off to a 4-2 start. Kinne spent the 2018 season as an offensive analyst on Chad Morris’s staff at Arkansas and was Malzahn’s offensive coordinator at UCF in 2021. In his only season as Incarnate Word’s coach (2022), he took the Cardinals to the FCS Semifinals. The obvious downside to Kinne is that he’s been a head coach for all of two seasons, and just one at the FBS level, but his teams are fun to watch.
NC State at Duke (Saturday, 7 pm, ACC Network). If the lack of connections to great programs from Leipold, Fritz, and Chadwell are a concern for you, consider Mike Elko, who has coordinated defenses for powerhouse programs (Notre Dame in 2018 and Texas A&M in 2019-2021), is a Power 5 head coach (Duke), and has proven he can win at a historically-disadvantaged program (13-5 in two seasons). The Blue Devils are 4-1 and have a win over Clemson and a close loss to Notre Dame.
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