FAYETTEVILLE — Arkansas will be in Razorback Stadium on Saturday as Kent State hopes to pull off an upset in Fayetteville.

The Razorbacks are coming off a 56-13 win over Western Carolina. Kent State fell to UCF 56-6 in its season opener. After being in Little Rock last Saturday the Hogs will be in Fayetteville for this game. Sam Pittman is looking forward to Saturday’s game.

“We’re excited to come play at home in front of hopefully a sold-out crowd,” Pittman said. “I’ve been told that it’s going to be close. Play Kent State. Coach (Kenni) Burns has done a nice job there with his team. They play extremely hard. They do have some offensive weapons. I like the quarterback, he transferred in from Purdue. I like the running back. I think they’ve got a really good kickoff returner, and their line is full of transfers.

“Not full, but they have six transfers on offense. On defense, they’re aggressive on defense. They move more than what we saw last week. Still base out of a 2-high shell. I like number 5, a D-tackle, last name West. I like the two linebackers, very physical guys. They’ve got a corner and returner who’s a good player, so we’re excited to get home. We have high respect for Kent State and their program, but we’re excited to do the Hog walk in front of our fans, run through the ‘A’ and get home.”

Pittman will have an additional cornerback option this week with Kee’yon Stewart back on the field after being suspended last week.

“He’s got five events that he needs to go, community service-wise and things of that nature,” Pittman said. “And obviously he wasn’t at the game, we suspended him for Saturday’s game. But, he’s back, he’s back now. He’s got a few things to complete but he’s back on the team.”

The Razorbacks came out fired up on Saturday and jumped out to a 21-0 lead and then 35-3 at intermission. Pittman was asked if there’s any concern after winning big like that and then the opponent losing in a similar fashion?

“Yeah, I think that’s a good question but I think to be honest with you, and it’s maybe coach speak or whatever, but right now we’re just worried about us,” Pittman said. “You know, we’re trying to put the best product out there that we got. Play hard, try to play smart, try to play tough. Because, if you just evaluate yourself from the scoreboard, you’re going to disappoint yourself. I mean, you’re just going to be disappointed. Because, who is to say what you’re supposed to win by, you know what I mean? 

“If you win 38-0, are you happy? Not if we don’t play well. We’ll continue to do it, I think right now it’s more about how did we play? What are we doing? How are we getting better? How are we playing smarter? How are we chasing the ball better? How are we straining more? If we do that, we’ve got enough talent we could have a pretty good team. You know, we didn’t flash as much on the d-line. We’ve got to do that. They played fine, but they don’t play as good as what our expectations for them, or their expectations for themselves. We’ve got to get all of that fixed, and I think we will.”

Whether it happens this week or in the future, expect Travis Williams, the defensive coordinator, to bring more pressure. Pittman admitted that Williams seldom brought more than four against the Catamounts.

“I don’t know,” Pittman said. “I’d have to go back and look at that. Not many. Not many. I think going into the game, our plan was we were going to see if those four guys could get there and here’s what happened: the guy’s getting the ball out of his hands so fast that it wouldn’t have mattered if he brought 11. You weren’t going to get there. So at that point, we had a talk about, let’s switch up the coverages in the back end, but for us to have a blitz-fest, you ain’t going to get there any way. So, not many.”

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