What Happened With Matt Corral and the Ole Miss Offense vs. Arkansas?
Matt Corral threw six interceptions on Saturday at Arkansas. Two of those interceptions were returned for touchdowns. He's the first SEC quarterback to turn the ball over six times in a game in 13 years.
Corral turned the ball over seven times in total in the game. The offense has a whole had turned it over just once in the first three weeks. Arkansas scored 24 points off turnovers.
So what the hell happened on Saturday in Fayetteville?
"It was a unique look that they had. They never loaded the box once. The run game numbers were good but we struggled getting the run game going. So we tried to throw it," Corral said. "They were dropping eight. The windows were smaller."
Arkansas played a lot of four-deep coverage. In many cases they were only rushing three and dropping tons of defenders into coverage. They begged Corral to check the ball down. Instead, Corral was seeing ghosts.
More accurately, he actually wasn't seeing anything. Most of his interceptions came on balls thrown right at a defender in which Corral clearly never saw. A quarterback who had been nearly flawless through three weeks couldn't see the field whatsoever in week four.
"Having all 11 sets of eyes on you like that, they're going to read it," Corral said. "When I'm just looking at one defender, keying that hook player, that mike is going with him and going into that window. If it's not a perfectly thrown ball, it's getting tipped."
Corral entered the week completing 76% of his passes, third in the nation. He had a passer efficiency of 210.7, second nationally. He had thrown just one interception in three games. On Saturday, Corral was 20-38 for only 200 passing yards. His six interceptions brought his rating down to an 82.6.
Moving forward, teams are going to take this Arkansas film and try to emulate it. After three weeks of fantastic offensive play, there's now a game on film of how to slow down this Kiffin offense.
Corral says that Arkansas had shown similar looks on tape, but had tweaked what they showed on film. The Rebel staff had to adjust on the fly, and they clearly did a poor job of adjusting.
"We just have to get back to work. We have to do what we did to get there," Corral said. "I have to watch more film, because I obviously I hadn't been watching enough."
More From The Grove Report:
WATCH: Lane Kiffin Press Conference Following Arkansas
Ole Miss Defense Shows Impressive Signs of Life Despite Loss
You can join The Grove Report community by clicking "Follow" on the top righthand corner of the page or under the three bars on the top left in mobile. Also, be sure to like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter @SIRebels and @nategabler.
