Arkansas quarterback KJ Jefferson was listed as a game-time decision against No. 23 Mississippi State on Saturday. Head coach Sam Pittman stated that his quarterback was available but that he was unsure what would happen at kickoff. Jefferson suffered a head injury against Alabama last week and did not practice until the day before the Mississippi State game.
“Well, he’s available,” Pittman said before the game, according to Trey Biddy of HawgSports.com. “To be honest, I’m not sure what we’re going to do with him. However, he is available to play.”
Jefferson was dressed up and went through pregame warmups, according to media in attendance.
Jefferson previously experienced “mild symptoms” after being hit in the head during last week’s game against Alabama.
“KJ hasn’t practiced yet,” Pittman said Wednesday morning. “We don’t know if he’ll be able to practice today or not.” Our rule is that if we’re going to play you on Saturday, you have to practice on Wednesday. So it’s a case of “wait and see.” To be honest, I’m not sure if he’ll be able to practice today. However, there is a chance that he will.
“He has attended all meetings.” He has attended both practices. We’ll just have to see if he can practice. To be honest, I don’t have an answer right now as we sit here. We’ll certainly practice him if he’s capable of doing so.
If he isn’t, we won’t. That is not my decision. But, whatever the case may be, we’ll take a look at them and proceed from there.”
Arkansas quarterback KJ Jefferson was limited to 13-of-24 passing for 155 yards and one touchdown in last Saturday’s loss after going for 326 yards and three touchdowns against Alabama in Tuscaloosa last season.
“We need to throw the ball better on offense,” Pittman said. “Right now, we’re only one dimension.” We must be able to throw, catch, and protect, among other things. We can’t just turn around and hand the ball off and expect to beat really good teams. We have to improve.
“I wanted to run some go balls, and we experimented a little.” We always try to establish the run in order to throw play-action off of it, but we just weren’t getting open or throwing it accurately. We had to leave the field because we couldn’t stay.
You’re not going to be able to turn around and hand it three times in a row and get a first down all the time against Alabama. I was disappointed because I didn’t feel like we threw it, caught it, protected it, got open, and did all of those things well. It simply wasn’t there.”
