Arkansas 28, Missouri 3.
Little Rock weathermen and Las Vegas oddsmakers got this one right.
Both the rain, which held down the crowd, and the outcome Friday were expected as Arkansas closed a 7-5 regular season and Missouri, dropping to 5-7, ushered coach Gary Pinkel into retirement.
Alex Collins, in what could be his last Fayetteville game, scored three touchdowns, good for a 21-3 halftime lead, and topped 100 yards rushing for a Southeastern Conference-leading ninth time this season. A prized late addition to Bret Bielema's first recruiting class at Arkansas, Collins moved past Ben Cowins for sole possession of fourth place in Razorback history with 33 career rushing touchdowns. Whether he comes back for a senior campaign or turns pro, Collins has joined Darren McFadden as the only UA runners with three straight 1,000-yard seasons.
Brandon Allen, a week after throwing for seven touchdowns in a loss to Mississippi State, got the "W" in what, as a fifth-year senior, is definitely his last in-state game. Allen played the caretaker's role nicely on consecutive touchdown drives of 53, 84 and 79 yards in 32 total plays that zapped the life from Missouri's defense, which like any unit supporting an offense that can't score enough finally crumbled.
Fittingly, Allen left the field to cheers and with a hug from younger brother Austin, perhaps his heir apparent, who took a knee on the game's final play.
Allen, whose cause Bobby Petrino championed late in the coach's Razorback tenure and who earned his teammates' respect through good times and bad, has what any quarterback needs, says Aaron Taylor, the former Notre Dame offensive lineman who with Carter Blackburn and Jenny Bell formed the CBS telecast crew Friday.
"Toughness, accuracy and poise. Brandon Allen has all three," Taylor said. "There are some concerns about his height (6-3), but he's played his way into helping some team win on the next level."
An NFL career for Allen would go a long way to silencing every critic the Fayetteville High product, whose father is a fixture in the Razorback athletic department, ever developed en route, would it not?
Likewise, a bowl victory, for an 8-5 record, would encourage Arkansas fans about their team after a season that injuries, particularly to running back Jonathan Williams in preseason, limited the Razorback offense at times.
September, when Arkansas lost to Toledo, Texas Tech and Texas A&M on successive Saturdays, seems so long ago. The Razorbacks played better on the road against Alabama than the 31-14 final score indicates, then survived gutchecks at home against Auburn and at Ole Miss. Two plays from those games, both in overtime, should enter the pantheon of Razorback legend, an Allen fourth-and-two pass against Auburn and tight end Hunter Henry's over-the-shoulder lateral against Ole Miss that Collins fielded on one hop and converted a fourth-and-long play that set up a touchdown and Allen's game-winning two-point conversion in a 53-52 Oxford epic.
Arkansas then stuffed Leonard Fournette and LSU in Baton Rouge and lost by the narrowest of margins to Dak Prescott and Mississippi State in one of the most exciting Fayetteville games ever. The Razorbacks were seldom great this season but other than against Toledo in a Week 2 Little Rock yawner, Bielema's third Arkansas team was never dull.
Losing to Mississippi State robbed the Missouri game of some luster, and the forecast of heavy rain kept many at home. By game's end, the Bobby Hopper Tunnel on Interstate 49 south of Fayetteville, along with Northwest Arkansas Mall and some of NWA's plushest restaurants were filled with fans who did not endure the finish at Reynolds Razorback Stadium. Take it one from someone who has sat in Section M: Driving rain and a north wind make for terrible football watching in Fayetteville in late November.
But those who stayed, or watched closely on TV, witnessed a scene that transcended the game. Gary Pinkel, ending a Missouri career that began in 2001 against an Urban Meyer-coached Bowling Green, walked across the rain-soaked turf to shake hands with his coaching counterpart.
After Pinkel exchanged pleasantries with Bielema, several Razorback players also wished godspeed to the man who coached Missouri to five 10-win seasons and supported his team in an on-campus controversy this fall that could have ripped the school apart.
Missouri, like the weathermen and oddsmakers on Thankgiving Friday, got it right when it hired Gary Pinkel. Here's hoping that this great university finds a successor of equal stature.
Sports on 11/28/2015