FAYETTEVILLE – Chad Morris was visibly upset following Arkansas’ embarrassing 52-6 loss to Mississippi State last Saturday. His mood hadn’t improved much by the time he met the media for his weekly press conference on Monday.
Morris, now 2-9 in his first season as the head Hog, continued to use the word “unacceptable” several times in describing the team’s worst conference loss of the year.
He also announced the suspension of two defensive starters in cornerback Ryan Pulley and safety Kamren Curl, who were seen taking pictures and exchanging information with members of Mississippi State’s dance team prior to Saturday’s game in Starkville.
Their absence will be felt as Arkansas prepares for Friday’s 1:30 p.m. game at Missouri, which boasts one of the SEC’s top offenses, but Morris is out of patience.
“I’m not going to compromise,” Morris said. “I’ve been here before. I know what it looks like and I know what it looks like moving forward. I said after the game it’s just unfortunate. Because the love of the Hogs across our great state and across the country, and the passion that our fans and alumni have for our great university, needs to be shown a competitive effort by everybody every day.
“We’ve got a lot of people – a lot of people – pouring their hearts and souls into this program, but we need more. And we’re going to get more.”
Until Saturday’s beatdown at Mississippi State, most Razorback fans had come to accept the fact that it was simply going to be an ugly first year for Morris.
The Hogs had already taken embarrassing losses against Colorado State and North Texas, but some of the closer losses to Texas A&M, Ole Miss and LSU gave fans a sliver of hope that Arkansas would at least be competitive for the remainder of the year.
There was absolutely nothing competitive about the Hogs’ performance against the Bulldogs. The lopsided score led to a very frustrating last few days for everyone involved.
“There’s no doubt [frustration plays a factor],” Morris said. “I firmly believe you create your own breaks and we’re not getting too many breaks right now. So you have to respond. What’s our response going to be? We’ve got to get out of it.”
In order for Arkansas to get out of their current mess, they’ll need to overhaul the roster as quickly as possible.
Morris and his staff are in the process of doing that with the 2019 class, which currently ranks as high as 10th nationally by one major recruiting service.
The Razorbacks will sign a maximum of 29 new additions in this year’s cycle, which includes counting four signees back to last year’s class.
That’s a step in the right direction, but one class isn’t going to immediately fix Arkansas’ issues.
Even if the Razorbacks were to land Clemson quarterback transfer Kelly Bryant – who, unfortunately for the Hogs, was in attendance for Mississippi State’s big win on Saturday – Arkansas still has a long way to go in other areas.
It’s becoming pretty clear that Morris and his staff are facing more than just a talent deficit, too.
That’s why the weeks that follow Friday’s season finale will likely include several players announcing their plans to transfer.
Not only is it necessary from a numbers standpoint, as the Hogs still need some attrition to make 29 signees possible, it’s also important for Morris to get guys that he believes are completely bought in to what he’s trying to do in Fayetteville.
Saturday’s final score proved that he has very few buying-in this season.