FAYETTEVILLE -- The Arkansas football defense has matched up against strong rushing attacks by Notre Dame, Texas A&M, Memphis, Ole Miss and Tennessee, which are all ranked among the top 38 in the country.
But the Razorbacks have not faced one as potent as that posed by Missouri in Saturday's 2:30 p.m. season finale.
The Tigers, with the SEC's top rusher Ahmad Hardy leading the way, churn for 226.1 yards per game to pace the SEC and rank eighth in the country. Outside of the service academies -- Navy, Army and Air Force, who all rank in the top five -- the Tigers are sixth overall and third among Power 4 teams behind Utah and Oregon.
Missouri (7-4, 3-4 SEC) will try to extend its winning streak in the Battle Line Rivalry to four games, while Arkansas (2-9, 0-7) will attempt to snap a nine-game losing streak at Reynolds Razorback Stadium.
Hardy's 127.6 rushing yards per game are second in the county to Jacksonville State's Cam Cook, and his 15 rushing touchdowns are tied for fourth. The 5-10, 210-pound transfer, a finalist for the Doak Walker Award that goes to the top running back in the country, isn't just a high volume carrier. Sure, his 214 attempts rank eighth nationally, but he also averages a robust 6.56 yards per carry, the most among any ball carrier with more than 185 attempts.
"Man, he's probably one of the best backs in college football," Arkansas defensive tackle Cam Ball said. "Just watching him on film, he has the physical build of an NFL-style running back. He runs hard.
"He tries to continue to move forward and continue to get YAC yards, you know, yards after contact. We've faced a lot of great running backs this year, and we're just going to add him to the list of great running backs and prepare for him like anybody else. But he is a good player, no doubt."
Arkansas interim coach Bobby Petrino said Hardy and his backup, 6-0, 212-pound sophomore Jamal Roberts, are the perfect build for Missouri's running style.
Arkansas interim coach Bobby Petrino looks on, Saturday, Nov. 22, 2025, during the fourth quarter the Razorbacks' 52-37 loss to the Texas Longhorns at Darrel K Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium in Austin, Texas. (Hank Layton/WholeHogSports)
"They've got a great running back," Petrino said during his stint on the "Razorback Football Live" radio show Wednesday. "He breaks a lot of tackles. He's very physical and that's how they run their offense, through him. So we've got to do a good job of stopping him. I think we have a good plan for it and our guys executed it fairly well today."
According to Pro Football Focus, Missouri's top three backs have forced 109 missed tackles on 323 carries. Hardy is third in the country with 71 missed tackles forced, per the website.
Sixth-year Missouri coach Eli Drinkwitz's attack has held up over time in the SEC. Hardy joins Cody Schrader (2023) and Tyler Badie (2021) as Tiger running backs who have been Doak Walker Award finalists in the past five seasons.
"They love that stretch (play)," Ball said. "They love the outside zone. They love to run sideline-to-sideline, get you tired. And now this year they kind of implemented an up-tempo offense."
Ball described Missouri center Connor Tollison, who missed last year's 28-21 win over the Razorbacks, as "a hell of a player as well."
Missouri quarterback Beau Pribula returned from a dislocated ankle for last week's 17-6 loss at No. 8 Oklahoma. While the 6-2, 212-pounder passed for 231 yards, he threw a pair of interceptions to take his season total to nine, two less than Arkansas quarterback Taylen Green in two fewer games.
Arkansas has only eight takeaways on the season and only two in SEC games, which Petrino recognized could be a big factor if the Razorbacks can change the trend.
"We need to get some turnovers," he said during the radio show. "It's something we've been lacking and something we've been doing is turning it over too much. Certainly if we could get on the positive side of the turnover game it would help us.
"I think always the way you get quarterbacks to turn the ball over is to pressure them and hit them, so we've got to be able to get to their quarterback."
Petrino drew a distinct difference between Arkansas 1,000-yard rusher Mike Washington and Hardy.
"The thing (Washington) does as well as anyone in the country is he's got that acceleration for the first 4 yards that separates through the hole and gets into the secondary a lot," Petrino said on the radio show.
"Their back is a little bit different. He paces himself. He's a little bit slower, then sees it and makes the cut. And he's powerful. He's a little thicker and has wide hips and is powerful. We have to make sure we wrap up and tackle him correctly."
Arkansas has held its past three opponents -- Mississippi State, LSU and Texas -- to 119.3 rushing yards per game, but the Hogs' full-season number of 173.6 yards per game ranks 15th in the SEC and 102nd in the nation. Those figures were inflated by Memphis' 290 rushing yards, Tennessee's 264 yards and Auburn's 230 yards.