Alabama Football Smokes Arkansas Razorbacks, 52-3

The Crimson Tide defense limits the Razorbacks to just 188 yards on offense, the second-fewest allowed all season

Joey Blackwell | Dec 12, 2020

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — Alabama football closed out its 2020 regular season as the only undefeated team in the Southeastern Conference, slow-cooking the Arkansas Razorbacks 52-3 on Saturday afternoon in Donald W. Reynolds Razorback Stadium.

While neither redshirt-junior quarterback Mac Jones or senior wide receiver DeVonta Smith would finish the game with a passing or receiving touchdown, the Crimson Tide offense still put forth an impressive display with its rushing attack.

No. 1 Alabama ran for 216 yards, en rote to out-gaining Arkansas 443-188.

The only major setback occurred after the Razorbacks won the opening coin toss and elected to receive. On the first play from scrimmage, sophomore linebacker Christian Harris suffered a shoulder injury while making a tackle and did not return.

“I don’t know exactly how bad it is yet,” Alabama coach Nick Saban said. “Doc said he’s going to do an MRI on it and he said he didn’t know for sure the extent but that would determine whether he could come back and play this week or how long he would be out.”

Aside from the defensive injury, Alabama's defense was swarming. In the first quarter alone, the Crimson Tide sacked Arkansas quarterback K.J. Jefferson four times, with freshman linebacker Will Anderson Jr. accounting for two.

After giving up an early field goal, Alabama shut out the home team. The Razorbacks were held 70 total yards on offense in the first half as the Crimson Tide blew the game open with four rushing touchdowns during the second quarter. Senior running backs Najee Harris and Brian Robinson Jr. had two each (Robinson later added a third), with Harris edging out Robinson in yards with 46 and 24, respectively.

“I think we got started a little slow in the game,” Saban said. “But as the game went on we got better and better on defense and controlled the tempo of the game on offense, kept the ball away from them so they couldn’t go fast. Did a pretty good job early in the game of getting off the field on third down which was really important so all in all I was really pleased.”

While not as effective as he usually is in the receiving game, senior wide receiver DeVonta Smith picked up the Crimson Tide's only non-rushing touchdown of the game with an 84-yard punt return for a touchdown in the first quarter.

First career punt return TD for DeVonta Smith 👀

What can’t this guy do?! pic.twitter.com/W0cAYEtJBA
— SportsCenter (@SportsCenter) December 12, 2020

At the half, Alabama led Arkansas 38-3, it's largest halftime lead of the season.

The Crimson Tide opened the second half with a 14-play, 89-yard drive that led to Robinson's third score of the game.

Comfortable with its 42-point lead, Alabama started rotating out the usual starters for the younger players to gain some experience.

After going 24 of 29 for 208 yards, Jones was replaced by freshman Bryce Young. Robinson and Harris were also put on the bench to rest for next week's SEC Championship Game, with each totaling 54 and 46 rushing yards, respectively.

"I think regardless of the circumstances we had to prove to ourself what type of team we have and what type of competitive spirit our players have," Robinson said. "For us to come out and compete today, that shows a lot about our competitive spirit as a team."

With under two minutes remaining, Alabama freshman running back Jase McClellan took one to the house for an 80-yard rushing touchdown.

No one was catching Jase McClellan 😤 pic.twitter.com/F2S81aHLHz
— ESPN College Football (@ESPNCFB) December 12, 2020

The 188 total yards allowed were the Crimson Tide defense's second-best effort this season. Alabama also forced four fumbles, recovering three of them, and picked off quarterback Feleipe Franks once.

Another season high for the Crimson Tide defense was in sacks, eight for 49 yards lost.

Alabama finished its 10-game, conference-only regular season as the only undefeated team in the SEC. Arkansas dropped to 3-7 and will now wait to see where it'll go for a bowl game.

“This was a tough situation for us,” Saban said. “I think one of the motivating factors was to win 10 SEC games in a regular season which had never been done before — it was kinda historic for them. That was one of the motivating factors for us and obviously we wanted to play to a standard.”

This story will be updated with quotes and video from Saturday's post-game press conferences.

Published Dec 12, 2020

JOEY BLACKWELL

Joey Blackwell is an award-winning journalist and assistant editor for BamaCentral and has covered the Crimson Tide since 2018. He primarily covers Alabama football, men's basketball and baseball, but also covers a wide variety of other sports. Joey earned his bachelor's degree in History from Birmingham-Southern College in 2014 before graduating summa cum laude from the University of Alabama in 2020 with a degree in News Media. He has also been featured in a variety of college football magazines, including Lindy's Sports and BamaTime.