Texas Football: Steve Sarkisian has always torched Arkansas

If the past success of new Texas football head coach Steve Sarkisian against the Arkansas Razorbacks is any indication of what’s to come in Week 2 of this upcoming regular season, this team will be in a great position. Sark is very used to facing Arkansas now after two years as the Alabama Crimson Tide offensive coordinator.

The reigning Broyles Award winner also was on staff under head coach Pete Carroll with the USC Trojans during two meetings with Arkansas, in 2005 and 2006. During Sark’s time as a college football coordinator/assistant, he is 4-0 against Arkansas.

He was also 1-0 against Arkansas when he was an offensive analyst in 2016 with Alabama. While he would later be named the interim offensive coordinator for the Crimson Tide in that season, he was an offensive analyst at the time Alabama beat Arkansas.

Sark returned to Alabama in 2019 and 2020 to resume as the offensive coordinator under Nick Saban. This time around, he was the full fledged offensive coordinator, though.

Although, you do have to recognize that the two teams that Sark was a part of for the five wins over the Hogs were absolute juggernauts.

Nonetheless, let’s take a look back at some of the numbers that offenses that Sark was involved with put up on the Hogs.

New Texas football HC Steve Sarkisian had some powerful offenses vs. Arkansas

The first meeting ever against Arkansas for Sark as a college football coach came in 2005, when he was USC’s quarterbacks coach. Former USC star quarterback Matt Leinart and the Trojans decimated the Hogs in 2005, by the final score of 70-17.

USC’s passing game really gashed Arkansas in 2005, to the tune of 445 yards and six touchdowns (also with no interceptions). The Trojans also dominated Arkansas on the ground, with nearly 300 team rushing yards and four touchdowns. USC had no turnovers coughed up in this game, and posted a total of 736 yards of offense.

That meeting in 2005 between USC and Arkansas saw the Hogs give up more than twice as many points compared to any other game that season.

Then in 2006, USC would also dominate Arkansas to the tune of a score of 50-14. That would also be the most points that Arkansas gave up in any game that season. USC also didn’t turn the ball over in that game. Sark saw John David Booty and Mark Sanchez post nearly 300 passing yards, three passing touchdowns, and no picks in this 2006 win over the Hogs.

Moreover, there was never a point where Arkansas was leading USC in the two meetings between these teams in 2005 and 2006.

Fast forward to 2016, and Sark is an offensive analyst at Alabama. The Crimson Tide actually had a pretty close game with a decent Arkansas team in 2016. Alabama turned the ball over three times, and had less than 100 more total yards of offense than the Razorbacks.

Alabama rolled with Jalen Hurts at quarterback in a 49-30 win over the Hogs in 2016. And the Crimson Tide offense was still impressive, registering nearly 50 points against the Hogs again, to go along with 517 total yards of offense.

Yet, once Sark had more control over the offense again with Alabama in 2019, Arkansas had a lot of trouble stopping them. Sark and the Crimson Tide put up a whopping 48 points against Arkansas in 2019. Mac Jones was the quarterback for Alabama in that game, taking over for the injured Tua Tagovailoa at the time.

And Alabama didn’t miss a beat, despite Jones having to takeover for the recently injured Tua. Mac registered 18 completions on 22 passing attempts, good for 235 passing yards, three passing touchdowns, and no picks. He also registered nearly 14 adjusted yards per passing attempt in that game.

As a team, Alabama tallied up roughly 250 more yards of total offense than Arkansas. Alabama also didn’t turn the ball over a single time.

Last but not least, Sark and the Crimson Tide gashed the Razorbacks again last season. Alabama took down the Hogs by the final score of 52-3 last season. Although, this was actually the first game where Sark was an offensive coordinator or quarterbacks coach facing Arkansas where his team gave up a turnover.

Alabama did turn the ball over once, on a fumble lost, in 2020 against Arkansas. But that was the lone turnover in this game.

The Crimson Tide did do most of the damage last year against the Hogs on the ground. All six Alabama offensive touchdowns came on the ground, and the offense had nearly 450 total yards.

All in all, it is clear that any time Sark is involved with a talented offense, as the coordinator or quarterbacks coach, the team has success against Arkansas. Now, those Alabama and USC teams he was on staff with were national title contenders year in and year out. That’s not a place where Texas looks to be at. At least not now.

Nonetheless, it is a good sign that Sark had so much success in scheming up against this Arkansas defense. Sark has averaged 55 points scored per game in the four tries against the Hogs where he was either quarterbacks coach or offensive coordinator. Even more impressive, his offenses only averaged 0.25 turnovers per game against the Hogs.

If Texas has any sort of similar level of success on offense against Arkansas this year compared to the past four meetings in this regard for Sark, it should be encouraging heading into this Sep. 11 meeting between the two teams in Fayetteville. Texas has reason to believe it should be the favorite, especially with Sark at the helm.

Texas is set to open up the regular season slate on Sep. 4 against the No. 23 ranked Louisiana Ragin-Cajuns at home at Darrell K. Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium. Then, the schedule doesn’t lighten up a whole lot with the trip to Fayetteville to face Arkansas the following weekend on tap. But we’re still waiting on Sark for a quarterback decision, less than two weeks from the season opener.