FAYETTEVILLE - Bret Bielema declared this week that true freshman Brooks Ellis might be the long-term solution at middle linebacker that Arkansas has been craving.
“I think he’s a natural at that position,” Bielema said Saturday after Ellis’ first career start in the Razorbacks’ 35-17 loss to Auburn.
Ellis is expected to be back in the middle Saturday when the Razorbacks (3-6, 0-5 SEC) travel to face Ole Miss (5-3, 2-3) at 11:21 a.m.
“Now that I’ve got one game under my belt, I’m a little bit more comfortable there,” Ellis said. “It’s fun being the leader and making sure everybody’s in the right spot.”
Arkansas has been looking for a take-charge enforcer at middle linebacker for years, but the problem has magnified the past couple of seasons. Tenarius Wright, Alonzo Highsmith, Terrell Williams, Otha Peters, Austin Jones and Jarrett Lake have all taken cracks at holding the job with modest results.
With Ellis, 6-2, 230, the Razorbacks have a player who looks the part and is eager to work into the role.
“Brooks has confidence,” said linebackers coach Randy Shannon, who compared Ellis to former University of Miami and NFL linebacker Dan Morgan. “He is a confident guy. That’s one thing you have to have in a linebacker.”
Bielema said he has been impressed by Ellis’ ability to call defensive signals.
“That was by far our best game as of late to line up and just get people in the right positions and get the call,” Bielema said. “They had some motions where they change the strength of the backfield and we adjusted to that very, very well.”
Ellis, who had three tackles entering the Auburn game, was credited with 6 total tackles, 1 unassisted, including a shared sack with Brandon Lewis.
“I think for my first start I did relatively well,” he said.
Arkansas’ revolving door at middle linebacker this season has included Jones, a senior; Peters, who returned earlier than expected from a broken forearm; and Lake, who had been an outside backer virtually his entire career.
“We haven’t been consistent there thus far,” junior linebacker Braylon Mitchell said. “But I feel like Brooks Ellis is getting the job done.”
Ellis said he is humbled by Bielema’s hopes that he can become the middle linebacker for the foreseeable future.
“I’ve got to keep working,” he said. “I’m not satisfied yet. I’ve got a long ways to go.”
Defensive coordinator Chris Ash gave Ellis a one game stamp of approval, saying there are a lot of positives to build off of for the future.
“I was very pleased with what Brooks did,” Ash said.
Linebackers coach Randy Shannon said it helped that Ellis had two weeks to prepare for Auburn’s offense.
“He made a lot of good plays inside and made some plays on the outside,” Shannon said. “It was about time for him to get an opportunity. He’s been grinding and trying to learn the defense, and like anything when you first get in as a freshman, you’ve got a lot of things going on and you have to bear down.”
Ellis’ successful debut in the the Razorbacks’ ninth game begs the question why he didn’t get the call earlier, a notion lamented by Bielema on Saturday night.
“In retrospect, I wish I would’ve made that move a little bit sooner,” Bielema said.
But Monday, Bielema said the decision to bring Ellis around slowly and give him two weeks to prepare for his first start was the right move.
“If we threw him in there too early, I think he might have gone through setbacks before advancements,” Bielema said. “We thought he was in a good position mentally, so we put him in there during the bye week and he got two weeks of practice and did really, really well.”
Up next ARKANSAS AT OLE MISS WHEN 11:21 a.m. Central Saturday WHERE Vaught-Hemingway Stadium, Oxford, Miss.
RECORDS Arkansas 3-6, 0-5 SEC; Ole Miss 5-3, 2-3 TV SEC regional telecast on KATV, Channel 7, Little Rock; KHOG/KHBS Channel 40-29, Fayetteville; KAIT, Channel 8, Jonesboro.
RADIO Razorback Sports Network
Sports, Pages 19 on 11/08/2013