We stepped it up little bit since yesterday. We're a hundred times more prepared than last year and we know coach [Reggie] Herring accepts nothing but the best.

We fought hard, they fought hard. We just didn't come out with a win.

You've got to prove yourself when you're a little bit smaller, because the first thing when you do something wrong they're going to say it's because of your size or something like that. You're going to have to prove yourself and show you can play with anybody.

That was our first meeting, and I probably didn't do as well as I could during winter workouts, 6 a.m., running in the morning. I just kept fighting and kept working hard. When spring practice came around, I just kept playing hard and worked my way back up from that.

They had a lot more talent last year. They still have talent this year, but it was different.

I grew up watching them because I was like 30 minutes away from them. They didn't recruit me. I didn't really care. I'm kind of happy they didn't recruit me right now because I'm kind of happy I wound up at Arkansas.