FAYETTEVILLE -- Bobby Petrino is back as head coach of Arkansas, this time as an interim, and is preparing his team for No. 12 Tennessee on Saturday.
Petrino has three new assistants on defense including Chris Wilson as the coordinator. He has Jay Hayes coaching the defensive line and Che Hendrix working with the safeties. Kenny Perry is the lone defensive holdover as he coaches the cornerbacks.
"Yeah, I’ve really liked what I’ve seen from Coach Wilson," Petrino said. "He does a really nice job of getting everyone to work hard and understand what he’s asking them to do. I think the communication that he’s had with the athletes has been very, very good.
"Jay Hayes I’ve known for years and years and years. I guess we first became friends because he played at the University of Idaho and obviously I coached at the University of Idaho. So that was one of the things that I guess brought us together. But he coached with the Cincinnati Bengals for a long, long time. Marvin (Lewis) was the head coach there and we’ve had a really close relationship for a long time since we met at I think it was DVC (Diablo Valley College) in California many moons ago. And then we used to go up and watch them practice at Georgetown College when I was at Louisville. So I’ve known him, watched him coach, watched him practice. He’s a really good football coach, so when he reached out and said he would be really interested in it, it immediately caught my interest."
While the defense has rightfully been criticized, but the offense has only scored 10 points combined in the second half of the last three games, all losses.
"Yeah, we need to continue to play with the same energy and excitement and detail that we have in the first half," Petrino said. "We’ve got to come out of the locker room with more energy. We’ve got to run the ball better in the third quarter. One of the issues has been to be able to run the ball with the same efficiency in the third quarter that we did in the first two quarters. We’re still doing a good job of converting third downs, which helps a lot, but we’ve got to do a better job of running the ball in the third quarter."
With Jalen Brown suffering a season-ending injury against Notre Dame Petrino feels Courtney Crutchfield and others have to step up.
"We’re going to need other guys to step up," Petrino said. "That’s a great point, you know. CJ (Brown) has played both inside and outside, so if we were going to run out there today and start, he would start at Jalen’s position, then (Raylen) Sharpe would go inside. We need Crutchfield to step up. He’s been doing a really nice job the last few weeks in understanding the offense better, running his routes more precisely. He’s a big, physical guy. He could really help us. He can play football and he can make the plays. It’s really not about that. It’s about that we can trust him to do the right thing on every single play. We’ve got to do a better job with him. That’s our job, is to get him ready and make sure he’s good to go. Because he’s certainly capable of making plays for us.
"Andy Jean’s gotta help out on the other outside receiver. He did, he had a really good couple weeks of practices and got in and made a nice play the other day. But you’ve got to be able to stay fresh and stay fast. He’s got to be able to help us out there. So I think that’s kind of how you look at it."
Petrino went into more detail on Crutchfield's conditioning when he arrived at Arkansas.
"I mean, first of all, when he got here, he was out of shape," Petrino said. "He spent spring just really going, Oh man.’ He was heavy. He had a little bit too much adipose tissue in his stomach area, and he worked extremely hard in the summer. I was really proud of the way he came back in the summer on the percent of body fat, his weight was way down, and all of a sudden, now you looked at a guy that had a hard time going five plays in a row fast. Now he's going eight plays, nine plays in a row, and getting in a position where you really like to see him It took him a little bit of time to learn the offense, that's understandable. Young guys, it's harder than, say, like Blake, who's been through three different installations, and now you pick things up a little bit quicker because you learn how to do it. But I do feel extremely excited about Courtney and his abilities, and now he has the understanding of the offense. I'm looking for him to get out there and make plays for us."
True freshman wide receiver Antonio Jordan was turning heads in preseason before he was injured. Can he help when he returns?
"Definitely can," Petrino said. "We were really excited about his camp and how he was playing. He's an outlier. There's not guys that are that physical size and that ability and can turn their body and jump in the air and make catches. He had a really bad injury, really bad ankle sprain. He's come back on it, and he's shown a tremendous amount of toughness. It's still bothering him a little bit. I'm thinking this week, three days off might help him a lot, but there's no question he's going to be a tremendous player here."
Arkansas and Tennessee will kickoff at 3:15 on Saturday and televised on the SEC Network.
Photos: Craven Whitlow
