While former A&M offensive coordinator Bobby Petrino’s homecoming as interim coach was delayed due to weather conditions, there was nothing he could do to stop the maroon wave of offense as No. 4 Texas A&M football won a 45-42 shootout over Arkansas.
“We’re making winning plays,” coach Mike Elko said. “We understand how to make winning plays. There’s a lot of positives. Four straight SEC wins, now, two big road wins.”
Tale of two fourth downs
It was a soggy day in Fayetteville, Arkansas, and that moisture was only added to as analytics nerds across the nation got the vapors over both teams going for it on fourth down in the first quarter.
After the Razorbacks took a rapid 3-0 off the back of a long run from senior running back Mike Washington Jr., Elko was confronted with his first major decision of the game when redshirt sophomore quarterback Marcel Reed came up one yard short on third down.
Without hesitating, Reed and the offense sauntered back to the line of scrimmage at their own 34-yard line. Using the T formation, redshirt sophomore RB Rueben Owens II lunged forward to convert. The play kickstarted a drive ending in redshirt freshman wide receiver Ashton Bethel-Roman’s first touchdown of the season.
“We were going to be aggressive because it was going to be a high-scoring game,” Elko said. “We knew our advantage was our offense against their defense.”
Petrino — who’s been known to go full throttle before — tried to get in on the action, sending out his offense to convert a fourth-and-1 on its own 49-yard line. Redshirt senior QB Taylen Green didn’t pull the trigger on what would have been a touchdown and gave the ball back to A&M on an incompletion.
The Aggies quickly took advantage as Reed glided his way into the end zone to make it a 14-3 ballgame. Two massive swings could have changed the tenor of the game, but instead resulted in a double-digit A&M advantage.
Running backs step up
With senior RB Le’Veon Moss unavailable with a left ankle injury, offensive coordinator Collin Klein found ways to get strikes without his fast ball.
Moss has become the battering ram for A&M’s offense, always able to knock down the door when needed, racking up 389 yards and six touchdowns this season. In his stead as the lead back, Owens sliced his way through a reeling Razorbacks defense for 69 yards and two scores.
The stable of running backs took turns making cameos and plays, with redshirt senior RB Amari Daniels, freshman Jamarion Morrow and graduate EJ Smith all having a moment in the spotlight with a 96-all-purpose-yard combined effort.
Smith — the son of legendary Dallas Cowboys running back Emmitt Smith — flexed his muscle on a third-quarter drive by picking up 33 yards and a disallowed-by-penalty touchdown. The Dallas native also pinballed off defenders to convert a critical fourth-and-1 in the fourth quarter, keeping the drive alive and A&M out of Arkansas’ reach.
“He’s a talented back,” Elko said. “We have a lot of talented backs. He got going a little bit, got running behind his pads.”
Ashton Bethel-Roman empire
In the not-so-distant future, girlfriends will be making TikToks about how surprised they are to find out how often their boyfriends think about this Bethel-Roman performance.
The largely unproven redshirt freshman WR came into Fayetteville with only five catches, but he left with two of the biggest plays of the day. Bethel-Roman torched his man on the perimeter to pull down the first touchdown of the day on a 24-yard pass from Reed.
Despite the offensive explosion from the Aggies, Bethel-Roman remained mostly a non-factor until the fourth quarter, right when the Maroon and White needed it most.
With neither defense looking like it was interested in getting a stop, A&M needed to keep piling on points in the 38-35 contest. Bethel-Roman won again on a fade route and pinned Reed’s teardrop to his chest for a 37-yard gain to put A&M in scoring position. It wasn’t a massive day for Bethel-Roman in terms of yardage, but all 84 mattered in the shootout.
“Anyone in that locker room can do anything,” Bethel-Roman said. “That’s what we came here to do. When our number is called, we just play up to our standard.”
Razorbacks run wild
The gutsy Green grimaced through a leg injury all day, but it didn’t stop the fifth-year passer from galloping through A&M’s defense for 256 yards passing, 86 on the ground and five total touchdowns.
For an A&M defense that has allowed 67.7 yards per game in Southeastern Conference play, the 268 surrendered to Arkansas marked a jarring step back — and a reminder that the group had not faced a mobile quarterback of Green’s caliber.
“He’s a great athlete,” junior safety Marcus Ratcliffe said. “He’s a superior athlete. Super fast, super quick, super long.”
Washington also thrived in traditional running plays, ripping off explosive runs of 10-plus yards on four separate occasions in a 147-yard, 9.2-yards-per-tote performance.
The saving grace for the Aggie defense was a pass rush that continues to feast in the SEC, especially on a Razorback offensive line that gives up almost two sacks per game. Five players got to Green, applying pressure throughout the afternoon and was the one thing that temporarily halted the Hogs’ progress.
Sacks from freshman defensive end Marco Jones and junior S Dalton Brooks kept the clock running on Arkansas’ final drive, which ostensibly ended the game by not giving the Razorbacks enough time for a second score.
The Aggies won’t have to deal with a dual-threat quarterback next week, when A&M looks to improve to 8-0 against No. 10 LSU at Tiger Stadium in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, at 6:30 p.m.
