Ryan Silverfield didn’t throw anybody under the bus Monday.
He came pretty close to throwing his hands up, though.
The Arkansas coach met with reporters two days after a Saturday night loss to Missouri. The idea was to clean up the film and flip the page to Auburn. Instead, he spent a good chunk of his time explaining things he’s already explained.
Somebody finally asked the obvious question. Silverfield’s last four Memphis teams finished on the plus side in turnover margin. Two years ago, they were second in the country.
This year’s Razorbacks are hovering around minus-0.25.
So what gives?
“I’ll tell you, for the first time sitting up here, I don’t know if I have an exact answer,” Silverfield said.
The coach isn’t blaming the roster out loud
Credit him for saying it. Plenty of coaches would’ve made something up.
Then he walked through the season’s greatest hits. A quarterback who’s still getting used to starting. Antonio, who Silverfield said “has played some football, but not a ton.” A fumbled snap. KJ banging his elbow on a spin and the ball bouncing off one of his own teammates.
You can’t make that last one up.
“Throughout the whole season, there have been a variety of reasons,” he said.
That’s about as close as a coach gets to saying the cupboard’s a little bare.
He didn’t stop with the ball carriers, either. Silverfield said his tackles gave up inside moves too quickly. Blocks didn’t hold up in the run game. His receivers dropped seven passes.
“Those are things that just cannot happen,” he said.
Same problems, different Saturday
Silverfield’s been preaching this stuff since he got to town. He said taking care of the football was supposed to be a pillar of this program.
Pillars aren’t supposed to wobble this much.
The defense has its own version of the story. It looks fine for a half and then springs a leak. Silverfield pointed to missed tackles, bad angles in the secondary and not setting the edge. The Hogs gave up six yards a carry, and a blown coverage handed Missouri a red zone touchdown.
He said the effort’s been there. Nobody’s really arguing that point.
The penalties are a different deal. Silverfield can live with a holding call or pass interference. The unnecessary roughness after the whistle?
“Shame on us,” he said.
Oh, and Eli Drinkwitz apparently cracked a postgame joke about changing the light bulbs. Silverfield said he hadn’t seen it because he’s off social media.
His only answer was that you protect your own place by winning football games. Probably the right call.
Auburn won’t feel sorry for anybody
Now the Razorbacks hit the road to deal with Alex Golesh’s offense. It runs one of the fastest tempos in college football.
Byrum Brown runs it. He’s got 40 career starts, the most in the SEC. Silverfield said he’s also Auburn’s leading rusher and has scored a rushing touchdown in six straight games.
“He’s one of the top athletes in all of college football,” Silverfield said.
Auburn’s defense ranks third in the SEC in takeaways. For a team with Arkansas’ ball security issues, that’s not exactly welcome news.
Chas Nimrod’s out there too. He’s an Arkansas kid and, according to Silverfield, “one of the most talented receivers in this conference.”
Silverfield laid out the headache pretty plainly. Roll coverage toward Nimrod and you’re light against the run. Load the box for Brown and you’re thin on the outside.
To be fair, Silverfield beat Golesh three straight times at Memphis. Two of those went down to the last few possessions. Different league and different rosters this time around.
Health and the headset
The injury report isn’t helping. Silverfield said it’s wait and see on Marshall and Russell. They were getting treatment Monday, and he won’t know more until they go live in practice.
On Marshall’s lower-body injury, he said “if a guy is at 60 percent, it’s really hard to go.”
He backed Tim Cramsey, who calls the offense on game day, and said he has great faith in him. When asked about in-season staff changes, he didn’t rule anything out. “Whatever it takes for us to be successful, we’ll do,” he said.
Look, I’m not saying Silverfield’s out of ideas. He talked Monday about wanting Arkansas teams to keep fighting no matter the score, and I believe him.
Squeezing the football is something you can clean up in a week of practice. Talent takes a lot longer than that.
The Hogs have until Saturday to show him it’s the first problem and not the second.
