It was a tale of two halves Saturday in the Southwest Classic.
No. 18 Arkansas rallied from an 18-point halftime deficit for a 42-38 win over No. 14 Texas A&M in front of 69,838 fans at Cowboys Stadium.
Razorbacks senior running back Broderick Green’s 3-yard touchdown run with 1:41 left was the go-ahead score and completed the Hogs’ largest comeback since rallying from a 18-point deficit to beat Louisiana-Monroe in 2008.
“Wow,” Arkansas coach Bobby Petrino said. “What a day’s work. It took a full day’s work to win that one. Very, very proud of our football team. We came in at halftime, we talked a lot about competing, tackling better, running full speed to the ball. Offensively, we needed to believe that we could come back and win the game and keep executing. Our coaches did a great job in the second half. Our players played with a tremendous amount of heart, competitive spirit and toughness.
“That’s a good win. that’s a really good win.”
Junior quarterback Tyler Wilson completed 30 of 51 passes for a school-record 510 yards and three touchdowns in leading his first comeback win. Senior receiver Jarius Wright caught a school-record-tying 13 passes for a school-record 281 yards and two touchdowns.
“It was pretty awesome,” Petrino said. “Jarius is just out there competing. He was extremely fast in the game. I think our speed showed up on the offensive side at wide receiver. Tyler did a great job of standing in, competing, playing one play at a time, his ability to show toughness and play one play at a time and hang together.”
Wilson bounced back after struggling in a 38-14 loss at No. 3 Alabama the previous week.
“I’ve been on him really hard,” Arkansas offensive coordinator Garrick McGee said. “He had a really tough week and for him to come out fighting like that show’s what he has inside of him. He’s a competitor.”
The Hogs trailed 35-17 at halftime, but rallied to tie the game 35-all after Wright recovered junior receiver Cobi Hamilton’s fumble in the end zone.
“4-1 is a completely different story than 3-2,” Wilson said. “Moral going forward is completely different. We’re in much better position … It shows what kind of team we’ve got. We’ve got guys that believe and aren’t going to give up.”
The Aggies retook the lead on Randy Bullock’s 23-yard field goal with 4:22 left in the game.
Arkansas drove down the field before Green’s 3-yard run gave the Razorbacks their first lead of the game.
Green finished with 25 yards and two touchdowns on nine carries in his season debut, just five months after tearing his ACL in spring practice.
“I haven’t even been out there with the guys in five months, so it’s amazing,” Green said. “The o-line made a huge hole. The play was designed to go off the left side and I saw it and I hit it.”
The Hogs forced the Aggies to turn the ball over on the subsequent possession, then ran out the clock. Arkansas held Texas A&M to three points and forced two turnovers in the second half after allowing 35 points in the first half and forcing just two turnovers in the first four games.
“We challenged them in the second half,” Arkansas defensive coordinator Willy Robinson said. “Challenged them about showing courage. Challenged them about showing heart and they did that.”
Both offenses posted huge numbers.
The Hogs totaled 581 yards of offense. Texas A&M finished with 628 yards, including 404 in the first half.
The Aggies running back duo of junior Christine Michael and senior Cyrus Gray carved up the Hogs’ defense in the first half, combining for 187 yards and five touchdowns on 24 carries.
Michael finished the game with 230 yards three touchdowns on 32 carries, while Gray had 95 yards and two touchdowns on 17 carries.
“Coach came in at halftime and made a great suggestion about playing one of our fronts we haven’t played in awhile,” Robinson said. “So we operated. We installed it. We put it in and it really helped us on the close side run and the zone stretch stuff. We had to be a little bit more solid on the back end of it, the outside of it, but our kids did a great job. They had great recall.
“For those coaches to be able to sit down there and chalk that up and our players to do it they were very attentive and they were really wanting to get that thing stopped.”