Modifying slightly a theme currently prominent on Facebook, I am so into Arkansas football that I remember:
* When they sold grass seats in the north end zone of Fayetteville's Razorback Stadium.
* When people attended Little Rock games for football rather than a tailgate party.
* Razorback antenna toppers.
* Osage oranges outside Razorback Stadium.
* Jon Brittenum, squeezed against the sideline, throwing left-handed in the 1966 game at Texas A&M.
* The night in Little Rock that the public-address announcer first called him "Lighthorse" Harry Jones.
* Feeling like someone had kicked me in the stomach after James Street's fourth-down pass to Randy Peschel on Dec. 6, 1969, but getting a great interview with both Texas players (and coach Darrell Royal) for a 25-year retrospective.
* Sweltering in Section 4 of Little Rock's War Memorial Stadium in the 1970 opener against Stanford (5 p.m. kickoff for TV purposes) and watching Jim Plunkett, that year's Heisman Trophy winner, dissect the Hogs.
* Orville Henry's lead in the Arkansas Gazette after a Little Rock victory in 1979: "Arkansas 17, Texas 14. Does anything else matter on this glorious day?"
* Consoling out-of-work friends in the WMS press box before the Texas game in October 1991, the morning that something new called the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette appeared in driveways and newspaper racks statewide.
* When someone jotted down the previous day's Razorback score during a commercial for a Little Rock Mexican restaurant before "The Frank Broyles Show" each Sunday.
* A Sunday in 1974 that Chris Schenkel, then the voice of ABC's college football, subbed for the late Bud Campbell as host of the coach's show.
* A seething Broyles, then athletic director, leaving the press box after a 1997 loss to SMU in Shreveport, the one in which Arkansas scored a touchdown and didn't know it.
* Fans arriving in Little Rock for the 1968 opener and wondering whether Bill Montgomery, John Eichler or Gordon Norwood would start at quarterback against Oklahoma State (Montgomery did, beginning a beautiful friendship with Razorback Nation.)
* Getting Broyles' autograph on the floor of Rice Stadium before an Arkansas game in the 1960s and clutching it like it was a Mickey Mantle baseball card.
* Watching the visiting team pull up in buses before the 1972 opener in Little Rock and getting an uneasy feeling about the game (Southern Cal, winning a top-10 matchup 31-10, went on to be national champion; Arkansas, which had Joe Ferguson but not much around him, finished 6-5).
* Watching Dennis Winston, for one, play the game of his life as Arkansas beat USC 22-7 in the 1974 opener at Little Rock.
* Lou Holtz wearing a green sweater for a Houston game in Little Rock and getting flooded with red-colored items in the following week's mail.
* Lou's first Little Rock loss with the Hogs, 1980 against Rice, my first War Memorial Stadium assignment.
* Being treated warmly by Lou and Beth Holtz at their Fayetteville home after media dinners during the coach's Razorback tenure.
* A Dallas sports writer, hopping a ride to his Little Rock hotel after the 1981 Houston game, asking "What time do the bars here close?"
* A sign in the south end zone during Holtz' last game in Little Rock, a 1983 shutout loss to SMU: "Sitting here in the rain watching Lou's losers."
* Going to the wrong dressing room after the 1987 Texas game in Little Rock and not hearing Ken Hatfield say his skin was "tougher than alligator hide" after a 16-14 loss to the Longhorns.
* Hatfield, after keeping it on the ground for the last three quarters of that jolting defeat, getting a Bronx cheer from Fayetteville fans after a first-play pass (incomplete) against Houston the following week.
* Jackie Sherrill telling sports writers to be short with their questions after a 1984 Texas A&M loss in Fayetteville "because I'm not going to be here long."
* Discussing possible replacements for Danny Ford in the second half of a 1997 loss to South Carolina and Houston Dale Nutt's name not coming up.
* David Barrett's pick-six touchdown off Tim Couch in a 1998 Little Rock victory over Kentucky, the biggest play in Nutt's first season before The Play (against Tennessee) That Shall Not Be Mentioned.
* Deriving inspiration from "The Great Gatsby" for a column headline after HDN landed at Ole Miss in December 2007: "Nevertheless, Nutt's an Oxford man."
* ESPN announcer Mike Tirico's synopsis of the 2001 Las Vegas opener in Little Rock: "A pillow fight, but competitive."
* Sitting in the Oxford press box and wondering if the 2001 Ole Miss game (Hogs won in seven overtimes) would ever end.
* Paul Eells' call of Fred Talley's fourth-quarter touchdown run against LSU in 2002, one of many big plays in "The Miracle on Markham."
* Feeling blessed to be a sportswriter when the national anthem is played before any game I cover.
Sports on 07/28/2014