Hogs’ season finally comes to end with yet another disappointment

LITTLE ROCK — The end is here … finally.

Arkansas finished up another 2-10 season that completes a program-worst 4-20 mark over two seasons. The 8-28 record for the last three years is a record of futility not seen since World War II.

Don’t start trying to blame anybody in particular. There’s enough to go around and so many different rabbit holes to go down doing that it’s a waste of time.

Ultimately, it doesn’t matter how or why it happened.

A program that had struggled for some consistency found it in 1958 and it lasted over 50 years before the slow descent into hell a new coach will inherit in the next few days (or weeks).

The Razorbacks have two less wins than Kansas over the last two years.

“I’ve never seen anything like it,” interim coach Barry Lunney, Jr., said of a bizarre few weeks after a season-ending 24-14 loss to Missouri on Friday. “And I don’t know if I will again.”

None of the Hogs fans have seen it, either. The last time they were this bad nobody was really paying attention. Against the Tigers, everything wrong with this program was highlighted at some point.

“We obviously didn’t play well enough to win,” Lunney said. “We didn’t deserve to win.”

Dropped passes, blown assignments, inexperience at quarterback are kind of a simple summary. We saw it start at the end of 2016 with a coach that was coasting and accelerated with a coach that started off confused and was still baffled when he was fired a few weeks ago.

This time, though, it didn’t appear to be a stark lack of of interest among the players. The effort was there, especially on defense where they made plays … just not enough.

“For two weeks these guys — through a difficult situation — very clearly gave everything they had in an effort to win the game tonight,” an obviously emotional Lunney said later. “For that I am very thankful.”

For many of the players, it’s an end to a ton of frustration.

“I don’t think I have ever not been frustrated these last three years,” senior linebacker De’Jon Harris said later.

For a heralded class of freshmen who were playmakers and winners in high school, some have lost more games in one season than they did in their entire high school career.

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“At the end of the day all I want to do is win,” wide receiver Trey Knox said later. “We still came out with a loss, so I still feel bad.”

It’s those freshmen, by the way, whoever Hunter Yurachek hires is going to have to immediately start recruiting. Especially the 17 that have a redshirt from this season.

The recruiting season will be a few days instead of months for the second time in three classes. If the new coach loses a number of those guys, he’s going to have problems winning any time soon.

And fans aren’t dealing with any more excuses.

Lunney, who stepped into the interim role when Chad Morris was fired, also had to deal with one quarterback (K.J. Jefferson) not cleared after a concussion against LSU last week and, of all things, an outbreak of mumps that took several players out.

“It’s not an excuse, but its been a challenge,” Lunney said. “We were kind of a shell of our normal selves in some areas out there today. From a moral standpoint, it’s hard to overcome with that many guys out.”

There’s been so many things for this team to overcome in the last few years that you couldn’t find many people believe so much could happen to one program in that period of time.

You’d think they’d win at least one by accident.

Whoever agrees to take over this program is not going to have a lot to clear out to start putting his plan in place. There’s not a lot left.

While Lunney has earned a role in the program, he probably won’t have a shot at landing the head job in a permanent basis. He’s made the best of the hand he was dealt.

“Despite the circumstances, its been a special time,” he said. “I will always remember the way these guys have gotten behind me and listened to me; followed me.”

He does know whoever takes the job is going to have to work harder to find the best players in the state and keep them here. It’s been the backbone of every successful team for the last 60 years or so.

“It’s everything,” Lunney said. “If they get away, it has to because they want to get away. It can’t be because they weren’t pursued or they weren’t evaluated properly.”

Lunney knows what others found out — in the fourth quarter it sometimes seems just a little more important to those players from inside the borders of Arkansas … regardless of the recruiting ranking.

The three keys for success at Arkansas have always been evaluation, development and motivation.

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Yurachek just has to find somebody that understands that.

And remember he’s got a guy around in Lunney that can explain it to the new guy.