See Dick Pass. See Dick Run

FAYETTEVILLE — No one should ever confuse Casey Dick for Tim Tebow, Florida’s dual-threat quarterback and last year’s Heisman Trophy winner.

Dick has never been known for making plays with his legs, and he’s not the fastest or most physically intimidating runner. Even he admits he’s more likely to trip over his feet than fake out a defender.

But for now, the Arkansas quarterback can talk about his two rushing touchdowns in last Saturday’s comeback win over Western Illinois and teammates can refer jokingly to him as “Casey Vick.”

“I was a little bit shocked,” Arkansas tight end D.J. Williams said. “I’ve known that he could throw it all the time and that running came out of nowhere.”

Dick is more comfortable staying in the pocket and looking for his open receivers than he is tucking the football, running downfield and side-stepping a few tacklers on the way to the end zone.

But Arkansas coach Bobby Petrino said he wouldn’t mind if the senior ran the ball more when the opportunity presented itself.

And as unbelievable as it might sound, Dick heads into the second week of the college football season with more rushing touchdowns than Tebow (none) or Ohio State running back Chris “Beanie” Wells (one).

“He’s a good athlete. He can run, his times are good, his change of direction is good and I think it’s just a mindset,” Petrino said of Dick. “(It’s) getting him into the right mindset that I’m going to be a willing runner, and when it presents itself, I’m going to go make the run.”

Dick showed in Saturday’s 28-24 win over Western Illinois in the season opener that he’s capable of beating teams with his legs if given the room to run.

He scored his first career rushing touchdown in 28 games when he took off after the pocket collapsed with a little more than six minutes remaining in the third quarter and the Leathernecks leading 17-7.

Dick made two defenders miss, got a pair of good blocks from wide receivers Lucas Miller and London Crawford and darted 23 yards for the longest run of his career.

“I wasn’t really thinking six (points) when I took off. It just ended up that way,” Dick said. “I got some good blocks, tried to make one guy miss (and) probably almost tripped over my own feet but was still able to get in.”

Dick also scored the game-winning touchdown with 1:49 remaining when he took the snap and raced 4 yards to the leftside of the end zone. The play is typically used on two-point conversions, but Petrino decided to call it with the Razorbacks trailing 24-21.

In fact, Petrino said he “wasn’t happy” with Dick when the senior threw an incomplete pass to wide receiver Greg Childs instead of running for a possible first down on a third-and-10 earlier in the drive.

“Really, that’s when as a quarterback and (the defense is in) man-under (coverage) and a big window opens up, you’ve got to be willing to take it and go make yards,” Petrino said. “And he would have easily gotten the first down.”

Dick finished with seven carries for only 12 yards. But opposing defenses could be forced to look at him more seriously as a dual threat after he passed for 318 yards and accounted for four touchdowns (two rushing and two passing).

“When (Petrino) talks about (me) being a willing runner, he’s talking about when (defenses) just drop back and try to cover other passing lanes and drop seven or eight people and everything just opens up,” Dick said. “You can go and get 10 yards and get a first down. We’ve got to be able to do that.”