FAYETTEVILLE — Arkansas had 36 carries for 105 yards and three touchdowns in Saturday’s 56-13 win over Western Carolina.

The leading rusher was Raheim “Rocket” Sanders who had 15 carries for 42 yards and two touchdowns. However, Sanders’ status for Saturday is up in the air since he has missed both the Monday and Tuesday practices with an undisclosed injury.

While sophomore Rashod Dubinion, junior AJ Green, redshirt junior Dominique Johnson and true freshman Isaiah Augustave are capable of carrying the load if Sanders is unable to go it would still hurt to take one of top running backs in the nation out. The good news is redshirt senior left guard Brady Latham will return after missing the season opener. That should allow Joshua Braun to move back to right guard.

“I mean, Brady’s a captain, so him having that position on the team, it’s great having him back,” Braun said following Tuesday’s practice. “We know how much he’s given this program and how much he cares for it, so it’s definitely to have him. On the offensive line, I mean, he’s a captain of the team, but on the offensive line he’s also a captain. Just having him there driving the bus makes a whole world of difference.”

Braun, who transferred in from Florida at midterm, talked about his experience as far as left or right guard.

“So statistically, I have more experience at left guard,” Braun said. “Just on paper. I think I’ve started seven games at left, and two games at right. But throughout the three springs I’ve been a part of, and three fall camps, four fall camps — I’m old, I don’t really remember (laughs) — I’ve never had a rep at left guard in practice throughout spring and camps, but I have the game experience at left. So being to rely on that allows me to shift and just move around. It just helps me out.”

While the offensive line didn’t get the push they will need to in the running game they did avoid a lot of penalties such as false start, illegal procedure and the ones that haunt a team many times in the first outing of the season.

“It’s definitely a testament to the coaching,” Braun said. “Just the coaches make sure that we understand fully our assignments and what we need to do. As an offensive lineman, jumping offsides usually stems from worrying about the play, knowing you need to get off the ball and do a certain thing. But they’ve allowed us to be mentally-free and understand our role innately so we don’t have to worry about jumping the snap count, because we know exactly what’s going on.”

Braun also talked about some technical improvements the offensive line can make for Kent State.

“Yeah, I mean, definitely, no matter what, offensive line is a technical position, Braun said. “It’s something we’re going to be focusing on every week no matter what the product on Saturday is. You need to hit technique every day or before you know it, you lose it. So it’s just going into every practice not falling for the monotony of technique work. And so, it’s just something we focus on every day and need to get better at day-in and day-out.”

Redshirt freshman Andrew Chamblee started at left tackle against Western Carolina. Braun liked what he saw of the big guy next to him for much of the game.

“He was great,” Braun said. “He communicated very efficiently. Me and him were on the same page. Nothing comes to my mind of when we weren’t on the same page, so I believe we were on the same page every play. It was good to have him there next to me. Me flipping sides, I relied on him early on in practices to just make sure everything was smooth. It was a confidence boost having him next to me.”

Arkansas will host Kent State on Saturday at 3 p.m. in Reynolds Razorback Stadium. The game will be televised on the SEC Network.