No harm in UA playing in-state foe

Bob Wisener
Bob Wisener

If ever a football team needed a midseason break, it's the Arkansas Razorbacks. Even if they will be in action Saturday against Arkansas-Pine Bluff in an 11 a.m. kickoff at War Memorial Stadium.

The Razorbacks' spirits are low and their bodies bruised after seven weeks and three straight losses. The euphoria generated in a 4-0 start that carried the Hogs to No. 8 in the national polls has subsided. A team that scored victories over two top-15 opponents (Texas and Texas A&M) now finds itself 0-3 in the Southeastern Conference Western Division.

But can the Hogs handle the culture shock? Two weeks after playing a team coached by Lane Kiffin, the Razorbacks play one that defeated Lane College.

The historical aspects of the Arkansas-UAPB game far outweigh what on-field drama might be generated in the Razorbacks' only 2021 Little Rock appearance.. This, after all, is the University of Arkansas' first game against an in-state football team since 1944. A few months after D-Day, the Razorbacks of coach Glen Rose faced Arkansas State in a wartime season. Glenn Davis won the Heisman Trophy that year (Army teammate Doc Blanchard would follow the next year) and Notre Dame, as coached by Frank Leahy, was the biggest name in the sport.

Arkansas' football program, then struggling to compete in the Southwest Conference, made a significant trend upward in 1946 when new coach John Barnhill's team won the SWC and played a memorable 0-0 tie with LSU in the Cotton Bowl. It would not be until 1954, when Bowden Wyatt's 25 Little Pigs won another SWC crown after a showpiece Little Rock victory over Ole Miss, that Arkansas football became a going concern statewide.

Barnhill, upon becoming athletic director, brought in a Georgia Tech man, Frank Broyles, as Razorback head coach in 1958 and, despite an 0-6 start, fortunes immediately improved. Broyles' team captured three straight SWC titles (1959-61) and won 22 straight games from the end of 1963 until New Year's Day 1966. Unthinkably, the Razorbacks were ranked No. 1 nationally for one week in 1965 after slaying No. 1 Texas for the second-straight year.

Barnhill, a Tennessee man, played for and worked under the legendary Robert E. Neyland, who believed in bringing his team up to big games with a succession of "breathers." Many a Volunteer team girder for Alabama, say, against Suwanee or Wofford.

Broyles, with Barnhill's blessing, took the same approach at Arkansas: warm-up games, usually against Oklahoma State and Tulsa, before the conference opener with TCU, then a traditional power, and another light snack after the mid-October showdown with Texas, all to get his team humming before the November push (alumni month, he called it). Arkansas beat TCU 22 straight years and topped out against Texas with back-to-back-to-back victories, two at Austin.

As Arkansas' teams got better and consistently filled their stadiums, season-ticket holders began lobbying for showier nonconference opponents. The Razorbacks could provide a handsome check to financially strapped teams and stick out their chests against national powers. Stanford came to Little Rock with a future Heisman Trophy winner, Jim Plunkett, in 1970 and USC showed up two years later with what would be a national-championship team. The clamor died down after Arkansas lost both games (though beating USC in 1974) and ceased altogether after a 51-7 Little Rock shellacking from Miami (another future national champion) in 1987.

Except for the 1944 game with Arkansas State, UA steered clear of in-state rivals. Not that Arkansas officials felt any rancor against these schools; it's just that Barnhill, Broyles and their successors saw no reason to bolster the other teams' programs at the Razorbacks' expense. In truth, Arkansas fans expected blowout games while still fearing a Citadel-like (1992) upset from a huge underdog. "If Arkansas State played in my front yard, I'd pull the drapes," a local man expressed it once.

This became a hotter topic any time Arkansas fell from grace and especially after the Razorbacks played fewer and fewer games at War Memorial Stadium, their Little Rock home since 1948. In Broyles' lifetime, Arkansas played a tournament game each against Arkansas State's men's and women's basketball teams, winning the first and getting thumped (at Jonesboro) in the latter. Arkansas legislators, presumably with nothing better to do, kicked around an Arkansas-ASU football game. It was generally agreed that nothing would come of that as long as Broyles called shots at UA.

It took a new Arkansas athletic director, Hunter Yurachek, to bring about meaningful change. Yurachek, late of the University of Houston, began booking games against in-state opponents in other Razorback sports. If nothing else, he hoped to spur interest in all UA teams, some that sagged in the last decade. Plaster did not fall from the ceiling in UA athletic offices when the Razorbacks, say, lost to Arkansas-Little Rock in baseball.

Which brings us to Arkansas vs. Arkansas-Pine Bluff on Saturday. The state's flagship football team, one with a national brand and pro-like following, against the former Arkansas Mechanical & Normal College.

The usual trepidation felt against even the most meager Arkansas opponent is missing this week. As of Wednesday, covers.com did not list a betting line on the game. In strictest terms, an SEC opponent is judged superior to one from the SWAC whatever the sport, especially in football.

That said, expect Doc Gamble's Golden Lions to play with pride and represent their school well. UAPB, after all, played a spring schedule this year and went 4-0 in the SWAC Western Division, losing to Alabama A&M 40-33 in the conference championship game.

As did Arkansas with Lance Alworth, Steve Atwater and others, UAPB turned out a future Pro Football Hall of Famer, L.C. Greenwood, No. 68 for the Steel Curtain defenses of the Super Bowl champion Pittsburgh Steelers.

Monte Coleman, a 16-year NFL veteran, had some success coaching the Golden Lions. So did "Gunslinger" Archie Cooley, Jerry Rice's college coach at Mississippi Valley State, although Cooley was suspected of recruiting players, to quote Malcolm X, by any means necessary.

For Arkansas fans, who frankly need to catch their collective breath, it should be a no-sweat game. Look at the bright side: It makes more sense to play an in-state school rather than the last SWAC team, Alcorn State, that visited War Memorial Stadium. If nothing else, Arkansas should win in the court of public opinion. Think of it as a dress rehearsal for the Hogs' 2025 game in Little Rock, when Arkansas State renews a series that's been collecting dust since 1944.

Upcoming Events