Along with the countdown to bow season for Arkansas deer hunters, the sign man on U.S. 70 west of Hot Springs had another seasonal outdoor message for motorists Tuesday.
"Go Hogs, Beat Texas."
Just don't expect anything similar next week for the Georgia Southern game and maybe not again until Arkansas plays Alabama in November.
Lake Hamilton's football team has received special treatment from the sign man over the years. His place of business, after all, is in the heart of Wolf Nation. In a time of greater urgency for the home team -- which is not to say the Lakeside game -- look for a "Beat Greenwood" message.
Wally Hall, who like myself has seen a few Arkansas-Texas games, suggested in his column Wednesday that this series has lost something. That 30 years out of the Southwest Conference has diminished feelings toward Texas and that Southeastern Conference foes such as Alabama and Texas A&M, with a combined 22 straight wins over Arkansas, have become the teams to beat. Is it possible that Razorback Nation has moved on from the game that once served as be-all and end-all of an Arkansas football season, Cotton Bowl trip excepted?
Run a check on that when Arkansas and Texas play Saturday night for the first time in seven years and in the regular season since 2008 -- and the 79th time in a series that dates to 1894.
Some Razorback fans might wonder what all the fuss is about. They might be impressed, or not, that the 1969 Arkansas-Texas game brought out one Richard Nixon, who foresaw a Texas comeback when the Longhorns trailed 7-0 at halftime. Texas won 15-14, as you might remember, not the last time that people wondered what Nixon knew and when did he know it.
I feel remorse for those who, like the song says, "don't know much about history." Someone who never stuck a Razorback antenna topper on a car and might not grimace when James Street's name is mentioned. And wonders why Frank Broyles, usually as conservative as a Kansas Rotarian, passed for points in the fourth quarter -- Danny Lester intercepted Bill Montgomery's underthrown ball to Chuck Dicus in the end zone -- when a Bill McClard field goal would have made it 17-8 Arkansas.
If Street, Lester and Ramdy Peschel's names draw blanks with John Q. Razorback, he is not likely to remember Tony Jones. Said to have the worst hands on the 1987 Longhorn team, Jones cradled a touchdown pass from Bret Stafford on the last play in Little Rock after Fred Goldsmith, Ken Hatfield's defensive coordinator, called a time-out "to set my linebackers." A Razorback icon since returning a punt 81 yards in the 14-13 win at Austin in 1964, Hatfield saw the fans turn against him and a rift develop between himself and Broyles, his boss and former coach. (Thankfully, time has healed that wound.)
Once a seething rivalry despite Texas' 56-22 series lead, the teams have not squared off since Bret Bielema wrestled with his conscience -- eschewing a late touchdown with Arkansas leading 31-7 -- in the 2014 Texas Bowl at Houston.
Their last in-state game took place in Fayetteville -- the 2004 game, like this one, on 9/11. With Vince Young leading a Mack Brown-coached team one year from a national championship, Texas scored a first-quarter safety and won 22-20. Leaving Reynolds Razorback Stadium after midnight, a Texas fan told an Arkansas sportswriter, "You've got a heckuva quarterback." Come to think of it, Matt Jones could run in the open field like KJ Jefferson now.
That game followed the pattern of 13-12, 14-13, 15-13, 15-14, 16-14 (score of Otis Douglas' greatest Razorback win, 1951) and 17-14 games in the series.
One emotionally wrought game ended 7-3 Texas, and I would not be surprised if 80-year-old Jesse Branch, a Hot Springs Village reader who played for the Razorbacks that night at Austin in 1962, twitches when he hears the names of Tommy Ford and Pat Culpepper; Ford, on third and four, scored the only touchdown after Texas drove the length of the field in the fourth quarter; Culpepper delivered the goal-line hit that separated the ball from Danny Brabham on the goal line when Arkansas could have gone up 10-0. Long-memoried Hog fans still wonder if Danny scored before he fumbled.
Even Jack Crowe won his only game with Texas, 14-13 at Little Rock in 1991, the teams' last Southwest Conference meeting. The next day's game story appeared in the first Sunday edition of what a veteran of the Little Rock newspaper war called the "strange hybrid known as the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette." Former Arkansas Gazette staffers, filling their assigned seats in the War Memorial Stadium press box but with no story to write, were consoled.
Before the papers merged, Orville Henry's byline, after appearing for decades in the oldest newspaper west of the Mississippi, could be found in the Democrat. Gone since 2002, no Arkansas sportswriter is more closely connected with Razorback football than Henry, some of his gems from Texas games priceless.
• Texas, helped mightily by a fumbled Razorback punt, won the 1959 game 13-12 in Little Rock, offsetting a flawless Arkansas game plan in the biggest meeting yet between Broyles and Darrell Royal. "The operation was successful," Henry wrote, "but the patient died."
• After seven straight losses to Texas, Arkansas won 17-14 in Little Rock in 1979, freshman Gary Anderson scoring a Razorback touchdown with a downfield block from slow-footed receiver Robert Farrell. Repeating the score on Page 1A Sunday's Gazette, Orville wrote, "Does anything else matter on this glorious day?"
Sometimes, Darrell supplied the timely quote. A 29-12 Texas win 1976 in Austin on closing night resulted because "Earl (Campbell) got well." Street's fourth-and-four pass from his own end, perfectly thrown to Peschel, beating double coverage, for 44 yards, in the Big Shootout, moved Royal to say: "Sometimes you've got to suck it up and pick a number."
The 1976 game was the last for Broyles and Royal, moving Henry to write: "We know about Frank and Darrell. They topped out, sorta, the others bottomed out."
We are learning about second-year Arkansas coach Sam Pittman, who like Broyles way back when wanted the job. First-year Texas leader Steve Sarkisian was hired to win championships and beat Oklahoma, perhaps in reverse order.
Emotions are sure to run high Saturday on the 20th anniversary of 9/11. My Arkansas-Texas memories date to 1961 when the Longhorns, by 33-7, stampeded an Arkansas team with Lance Alworth that would play top-ranked Alabama for the national championship. Now, with Nick Saban winning at a higher rate than Bear Bryant, Alabama is the reigning national champion and ranked No. 1. Who says times have changed?
Even if you don't know the lyrics to "The Eyes of Texas" or know little about either team, take my word: You can enjoy an Arkansas-Texas game.