At Arkansas, walk-ons help get Razorbacks defense up and running

As trainers helped Arkansas cornerback Buster Brown off the field and into the injury tent at Mississippi State on Oct. 3, the next man stood in the defensive huddle getting pumped up by his teammates.

Hudson Clark hadn’t played a snap in the Razorbacks’ season opener against Georgia. Judging by how lightly he was recruited, no one in the FBS thought he should be playing a snap at all at this level. But here was Clark, a redshirt freshman walk-on from Dallas, about to take his first collegiate snap against an offense that the previous week had thrown for 623 yards against LSU.

In that huddle, Clark received encouragement and last-second instructions from those teammates. Safety Myles Slusher was in his ear up until the moment they returned to the field. Fellow cornerback Greg Brooks Jr. said his piece as well. The most comforting words came from linebacker/tackling machine Grant Morgan, a team captain who three years earlier found himself in the same…