Arkansas football’s 2025 campaign came to a merciful end with a 31-17 loss to Missouri on a cold, dreary Saturday after Thanksgiving.
Mizzou left plenty of crumbs on its plate with an inexplicable turnover and some hare-brained special teams mistakes, but the Hogs’ sieve-like run defense allowed the Tigers’ ground game to pave the way to victory. A fourth-quarter punt return touchdown was the nail in the coffin.
With the ugly weather, uglier record and the students out of town for the holiday, the stands inside Razorback Stadium were predictably barren. It put a damper on Arkansas’ senior day festivities, most notably the recognition of quarterback Taylen Green.
The Taylen Green era, which had been defined by Bobby Petrino’s ride-or-die support of the lanky gunslinger through two seasons, ended on a non-committal note. Petrino, now serving as the interim head coach, opted to split reps between Green and KJ Jackson at quarterback after the redshirt freshman performed well last week against Texas. Petrino was faced with a tough decision: a youngster who earned a chance at a breakout game and or a senior with the sixth-most career total yards in program history.
“They both did a really nice job in practice, and I felt like KJ earned the right to start,” Petrino said postgame. “I feel like Taylen put a whole lot into this program, competed extremely hard and didn’t get a whole lot of help at times. I felt like he deserved to finish playing in the stadium.”
Bobby Petrino’s Gambit
In hindsight, Petrino trying to have his cake and eat it too ended up throwing both quarterbacks off their rhythm. Green finished 6 of 13 for 59 yards, and Jackson was 11 of 17 for 126 yards and a touchdown. Most of that production came on Arkansas’ first scoring drive in the first quarter, after which Jackson was replaced by Green – a move that prompted some raised eyebrows amongst Razorback fans.
Petrino got a little testy with reporters after the game when he was asked multiple questions about the quarterback situation.
“It was already preplanned and ready to go,” he said. “That’s just how we were going to play the game, I don’t know what else you want me to tell you.”
The decision to pull Jackson so soon was a mistake – Petrino should have ridden the hot hand longer – but at the end of the day, the interim coach was put in a nearly impossible situation. Food for thought: if Jackson kept throwing well, couldn’t it be argued that Petrino should never have started Green?
Jackson’s 16-yard touchdown pass to O’Mega Blake ended up being the only one the offense produced. With Mizzou pulling away in the fourth quarter, fans started streaming to the exits well before the clock hit triple zeroes. The only stragglers after the game were the band, players’ families and a few hopeful kids looking for autographs.
It would have been easy for Green to fume over losing some snaps over the last two weeks and head straight down the tunnel for a hot shower. He could have easily brushed off Missouri coach Eli Drinkwitz’s attempt at consolation after disrespecting him in a press conference last year by deliberately mispronouncing his name.
Instead, Jackson and the senior gunslinger decided that since they couldn’t play together on the field at the same time, they were going to do the next best thing afterward. They took time to greet fans and sign autographs for kids together well after the rest of the team had made its way to the locker room.
