South Carolina 38, Arkansas 20: I Changed The Channel

Full disclosure, I stopped watching this game after Arkansas elected to kick a field goal when the Hogs had a 4th-and-goal and they were down 21 points late in the third quarter. That's the kind of experienced-head coach decision making Jeff Long was looking for when he decided to bring L back to coach this team.

It looked like Arkansas was at least going to make this a game for most of the first half. The Hogs tied the game at 7 and appeared to be moving the ball well. But as is the chorus for this team, they couldn't punch the ball into the end zone and allowed disaster to take place in the second quarter. It appeared the Hogs were going to get the ball back with a chance to take the lead just before halftime, but Spurrier decided to go for it on 4th-and-6 from the Arkansas 42-yard line. Naturally, Bruce Ellington was incredibly wide open and scored a touchdown.

Arkansas had a chance to respond before the half, but was halted around midfield. In a moment of high comedy, Arkansas called timeout with a second remaining before the half to attempt a hail mary, but Tyler Wilson was sacked anyway.

Carolina got the ball first in the second half, kicked a field goal. Hogs had a solid response drive going thanks to two D.J. Swearinger personal fouls, but then threw a pick-6 to Swearinger, who also picked up his 3rd consecutive personal foul penalty for throwing the ball in the stands after he scored. Not that any of them mattered. In fact, you could argue that the first two penalties only served to pad his interception return stats.

In the part of the game I did watch, Arkansas had 1st-and-goal on four occasions, only scoring one touchdown. They also kicked two field goals and fumbled the ball away once. Of Carolina's five touchdowns, they only had to enter the red zone twice. Arkansas' run defense was pretty solid, but the Gamecocks could simply do whatever they wanted in the air. Calling them "open" doesn't do it justice. "Alone" is probably more apt.

For whatever reason, they kept Wilson limping in the game until the end despite everyone else in the world pleading for Brandon Allen to get some garbage time snaps. Wilson did connect with Demetrius Wilson for a TD with 39 seconds left. Of course, I'm only reading about that after the fact. There were some actually good games going on at the same time (Tennessee and Missouri are in their 4th overtime as I write this), so, you know, had to change the channel.

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Doc Harper is the managing editor of ArkansasExpats.com and is a columnist for CollegeFootballNews.com. You can email him at heydocharper@gmail.com and follow him on twitter @doc_harper.