Perhaps seeking other viewing options, a family member points out that another Razorback baseball season is upon us.
This was said during the second half of the latest Arkansas basketball game, making one want to change channels, if not scream.
They played in College Station, Texas, alongside state Highway 6, where a campus visitor is asked not to walk on the grass It belonged not in Reed Arena, where Gary Blair made Texas A&M women's basketball both relevant and NCAA champion, but in old G. Rollie White Coliseum, the original "holler house on the Brazos." When the teams toiled in the basketball-anemic Southwest Conference, crowds were so sparse some nights that one could hear Reveille, the Aggies' mascot, barking in the distance.
About that time, Eddie Sutton was conducting twice-weekly tutorials on the sport statewide. Staying up for the tape-delayed telecasts at 10:30 p.m. on KATV (bumping into Johnny Carson's late-night crowd on another Little Rock station) became a ritual. A family member violated protocol one night with a call home, "Wasn't it bad about the Razorbacks losing?" (Now that you mention it, yes.)
Now that practically every game is televised, Razorback Nation wants instant analysis. As Sam Pittman's football team discovered last fall, swooning in November but winning a December bowl for a positive season record, fans want to know what's wrong and what's being done about it.
In the case of Eric Musselman's fourth Razorback team, one wishes to know less about weather balloons and more about Nick Smith Jr., a projected one-and-done star player, from North Little Rock, that Arkansas seldom attracts but who is rarely seen.
Hobbled by an ankle injury most of the season, one that Arkansas entered (and quickly left) the national rankings, Smith played five minutes Saturday night in the 70-64 home loss to Mississippi State. Not much of a sample to choose from but hopes were revived.
Smith played four minutes off the bench, missing his only shot, in Wednesday night's Razorback cave-in in Aggieland. A&M, which at 11-2 in the Southeastern Conference is where 6-7 Arkansas was projected, exposed the fragile state of Musselman's Hogs, winning 62-56 with a 15-point turnaround in the second half.
Over the din of the 11,315 inside Reed Arena, the teams provided stretches of basketball that might have made Reveille bark. The Aggies rattled the iron at a .352 shooting clip -- Arkansas a shade better at .440 but frightful on free throws, missing half of the 14 it attempted. A front-end miss and a conventional miss-miss trip by Arkansas abetted the last Aggie comeback.
He might play out of control at times but freshman guard Anthony Black does enough to earn one's trust. Black had nine points and eight assists, his two-hand stuff on the fast break prompting Aggie coach Buzz Williams to call time-out in the second half after Arkansas regained the lead.
Junior Davonte Davis, around the program longer than most on this young squad, hit the deck late but promptly clanged one from the line. He scored 14 points -- second on the team to the Mitchell twins, Makhi with team highs of 11 points and nine rebounds. Freshman Jordan Walsh, whose inconsistency is a product of youth, fouled out (as did Makhel Mitchell) after eight points in 29 minutes.
Arkansas' 17-9 record matches that of the first Razorback team coached by Eddie Sutton. What then seemed stupefying is seen now as disappointing.
But what is one to think when, same as in 2022 football, another favored Alabama team loses at Tennessee? A friend from childhood days, she and her husband big Georgia fans, was called this week and asked, "Has football started up again? I looked in the paper this morning and saw that Alabama's No. 1. What sport is this?"
For better or worse, and on many nights involving Arkansas it's hard to tell, they bill it as Southeastern Conference basketball. Viewer discretion is advised.