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Arkansas heads to Salt Lake City (Utah) this Saturday for its first marquee matchup of the season with the No. 21-ranked Utah Utes at 9:15 p.m. (CDT) on ESPN. The Hogs are looking for a better offensive performance after a lackluster showing against North Alabama in their 31-14 win on Saturday. On paper, Arkansas didn't have a terrible outing with 415 total yards of offense. But considering Arkansas was a 40.5 favorite in what should've been a cakewalk victory  program, only 31 points produced against an FCS program, a struggling run game, three turnovers, eight penalties for 74 yards and no explosive plays is far from what fans expected in the first game under head coach Ryan Silverfield. "I think the biggest thing is finding how we've got to coach certain things," Silverfield said on Monday. "A couple of the holding penalties, I've just got to make sure that we're teaching what is going to be called and what's not going to be called. That's on me as a head coach to understand how each conference calls certain things. "The interception, it's inexcusable right before half. The fumbles by both parties, inexcusable. Those are all the things that we talked about that, 'Hey, this is what we're going to hang our hat on,' Taking care of the football. Playing as disciplined, penalty-free as we can, and then relentless effort. "The only one that I saw, I thought the guys played with good effort. I don't think anybody doubted that. But those two are things; those are controllables we can get fixed, and we've got to get fixed in a hurry." FINAL DAY: Join HawgSports for 75% off until 11 p.m. tonight (Tues., 9.8.26)!! Join the No. 1 independent source on Arkansas sports with our best offer ever and get insider coverage like nowhere else!! Get unmatched Razorback coverage for the equivalent of 10 cents a day, 63 cents a week, just $2.92 a month and billed at only $35 for the entire year!! There is no promo code required for this offer, just HIT THIS LINK now, and you'll be good to go!! But hurry, this offer ends soon!! Junior quarterback KJ Jackson completed 24 of his 35 pass attempts (68.6%) for 267 yards, three touchdowns and one interception. While he picked it up in the second half, going 12 of 13 passing for 136 yards with a touchdown, Jackson struggled in the first half making the right reads, finding open receivers, spending too much time in the pocket and overall just looking timid at times in his first start. Along with his interception, he also fumbled the ball one time, which was recovered by North Alabama. But on that play, Jackson was crushed from his blindside after a missed blocking assignment by fifth-year offensive tackle Bryant Williams. "KJ would be the first to tell you no one's more disappointed in some of the things that occurred in that game than him, and that's what you want from a quarterback," Silverfield said. "You don't want guys that make excuses. You don't want guys that point the finger. "In fact at halftime, he looked me straight in the eye and he said, 'I know exactly what I did wrong, and I'll get it fixed.' To his credit, I think the second half was a cleaner set of football plays in the 30 minutes that he was out there in the second half. We all know KJ is calm, cool, and collected and no different. "He took very hard coaching, and to his credit, when I called him out in front of the whole team about his play not being of the standard of what we expect around here, he nodded and said 'Yes, sir,' and he gets it. He's been diving into the Utah film from the moment he's been able to and he understands it. I think that demeanor helps him."\ SHORE UP THE RUN The Arkansas rushing attack also looks for a better performance after a rough showing vs. the Lions. The Razorbacks ran the ball 49 times for 148 yards, averaging out to an abysmal three yards per carry, and none of Arkansas' running backs had over 50 rushing yards. After the win, fifth-year running back Sutton Smith said that Silverfield kept the play calling in the run game pretty basic. "I think once you get into the flow of the game, you never sit there and say the game's in our hands," Silverfield said. "But we felt comfortable with a certain number of plays. We went also went into this game, and like I do almost every Game 1, regardless of who our opponent is, is what can the guys handle? "Game 1 always, regardless, even next year, whoever we open up with, like what can our players actually handle? So we pared this game plan back even more against North Alabama and said, 'Ok, I went into that game with here are the 12 runs, which is very, very minimal. Now, obviously different formations, different checks, different motions, all those things. It was pared back to an extent, but that was done purposefully." After a warmup against North Alabama, Arkansas has their first huge test of the season on Saturday vs. No. 21-ranked Utah. Kickoff from Rice-Eccles Stadium is at 9:15 p.m. (CDT), and the game will be televised by ESPN.