Razorbacks picked fourth in SEC by league’s coaches on Tuesday
Arkansas was picked to finish fourth in the 2021 SEC preseason coaches poll, the Southeastern Conference announced today.
For Mike Neighbors, that is the highest projected finish ever for the Razorbacks.
Two Hogs were also picked on the preseason All-SEC teams: Chelsea Dungee, who makes her second consecutive appearance on the league’s preseason first team, and Destiny Slocum, who was named to the second team.
The full coaches poll:
1. South Carolina
2. Kentucky
3. Texas A&M
4. Arkansas
5. Mississippi State
6. Tennessee
7. LSU
8. Alabama
9. Georgia
10. Missouri
11. Ole Miss
12. Florida
13. Vanderbilt
14. Auburn
Arkansas will return four of its five starters from last season including Dungee, senior forward Taylah Thomas, redshirt senior guard Amber Ramirez and sophomore guard Makayla Daniels.
The Hogs will also be bolstered by the addition of Slocum, the highly-touted transfer from Oregon State, and redshirt senior guard Jailyn Mason, who missed all of last season with an injury.
Neighbors also returns other quality depth, including sophomores Erynn Barnum and Marquesha Davis.
Dungee, who is coming off a second consecutive Second-Team All-SEC appearance last season, will lead the Razorbacks into the 2020-21 season.
Dungee led the team in scoring (16.9 PPG), field goals made (171) and free throws made (146) during her encore season on the Hill. Dungee is closing in on several statistical milestones at Arkansas, including Arkansas’ all-time scoring title and all-time free throws made record.
Dungee needs just 530 points to break Bettye Fiscus’ program-record 2,073 points, and she has scored at least 540 points in each of her previous two seasons on the Hill.
She needs to make only 51 free throws to break Fiscus’ record in that category, and has made over 145 in each of her first two Arkansas campaigns.
Slocum, meanwhile, makes the SEC’s Preseason Second Team despite not playing a single minute for an SEC school during her career. Slocum was uber effective from the point guard spot during her two years at Oregon State, though, as she averaged 15.2 points per game, 4.6 assists per game and 3.2 rebounds per game, while shooting at a 45.2 percent clip from the field and 36.8 percent from deep.
Slocum’s stats were anything but hollow, though, as she helped lead Oregon State to a combined 49-17 record during her time there, including a run to the Sweet 16 during the 2018-19 season.
Oregon State finished the 2019-20 season at 23-9 and ranked 14th in the AP Poll.
The Full 2020-21 preseason All-SEC teams:
Player of the Year
Rhyne Howard, Kentucky
First Team All-SEC
Chelsea Dungee, Arkansas
Unique Thompson, Auburn
Rhyne Howard, Kentucky
Khayla Pointer, LSU
Rickea Jackson, Mississippi State
Aliyah Boston, South Carolina
Rennia Davis, Tennessee
N’dea Jones, Texas A&M
Second Team All-SEC
Jasmine Walker, Alabama
Destiny Slocum, Arkansas
Lavender Briggs, Florida
Shakira Austin, Ole Miss
Jessika Carter, Mississippi State
Aijha Blackwell, Missouri
Zia Cooke, South Carolina
Kayla Wells, Texas A&M
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Orgeron addresses USA Today article before talking about game with Hogs
LSU hasn’t played a game since Halloween after being kicked sideways by Auburn and LSU coach Ed Orgeron now is facing an improved Hogs’ team.
Now there is a story by USA Today on Monday regarding LSU mishandling of sexual abuse allegations and Orgeron addressed that before starting to talk about Saturday morning’s game in Fayetteville.
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Saturday Down South’s Connor O’Gara is ready to put the Gators in the top two or three teams in the league but is shocked at flip of Hogs, LSU.
Pittman ready to leave lamp behind, re-join team Wednesday for LSU game
Sam Pittman said at the end of his press conference Monday it would be the last time to see the lamp from home as he will be back Wednesday.
Hogs’ game with Missouri set for Saturday morning after Thanksgiving
In addition to not being played on the day after Thanksgiving, the SEC announced today the game with Missouri will kick off at 11 a.m. on Saturday, Nov. 28.
The game will be televised on the SEC Network and can be heard online at HitThatLine.com or on the radio at ESPN Arkansas 95.3 in the River Valley, 96.3 in Hot Springs and 104.3 in Harrison-Mountain Home.
The SEC Football Championship Game will be played December 19 at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta, rescheduled from the original date of December 5.
The SEC will utilize Dec. 19 as a playing date for football games rescheduled during the 2020 season due to the impact of COVID-19 and has established parameters that allow for the adjustment of game opponents.
The schedule allows one mid-season open date for each school and an open date on Dec. 12 for all schools.
The Razorbacks host LSU weekend for an 11 a.m. kick on Saturday, Nov. 21. The game will be broadcast on SEC Network.
Kickoff and television arrangements to date:
* Home games in bold
Sept. 26: Georgia (SEC Network), 3 p.m.
Oct. 3: at Mississippi State (SEC Network Alternate), 6:30 p.m.
Oct. 10: at Auburn (SEC Network), 3 p.m.
Oct. 17: Ole Miss (ESPN2), 2:30 p.m.
Oct. 31: at Texas A&M (SEC Network), 6:30 p.m.
Nov. 7: Tennessee (SEC Network), 6:30 p.m.
Nov. 14: at Florida (ESPN), 6 p.m.
Nov. 21: LSU (ESPN or SEC Network), 11 a.m.
Nov. 28: at Missouri (SEC Network), 11 a.m.
Dec. 5: Alabama (TBA), TBA
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Democrat-Gazette writer Tom Murphy looked back at the Gators just overwhelming the Hogs plus what he expects for the Tigers’ game.
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This week, Hogs’ Franks will be best quarterback on field against LSU
Arkansas defensive coordinator Barry Odom isn’t the only coach in football that’s pretty good at watching film and coming up with some pretty good answers.
Dan Mullen’s offensive staff at Florida did a pretty good job of that, plus they had better players a little better, which is why the 62-35 win Saturday night shouldn’t be that shocking.
Quarterback Kyle Trask threw himself into the Heisman Tophy spotlight with six touchdowns, throwing past the Razorbacks’ linebacker duo of Bumper Pool and Grant Morgan, who combined for 22 tackles … just a little above some of their individual best nights.
The Hogs couldn’t get consistent pressure on Trask, who had receivers talented enough to simply slice up the secondary.
Arkansas’ defense played hard and made a few plays, but the Gators are on a path that has multiple options of landing them in the College Football Playoff this year. This is their best team in over a decade.
Odom’s main task after this one was not letting Florida beat the Hogs twice.
“I talked to our team inside about life is made of a series of moments not defined by one single moment,” Odom said later. “Just like we won’t be defined by this moment. We’ll be defined on how we respond to this.”
LSU is coming up next and no one could have predicted back in the summer just how this game has turned from “no way” the Hogs could win to being favored from 1.5 to 3.5 points in the first Vegas odds Sunday.
Multiple people in Baton Rouge told me the Tigers get nearly all of their players back by Tuesday from the contact tracing quarantine that postponed the Alabama game last weekend. All of the chaos in college football is not being caused by positive tests but the quarantine factor for folks that have no symptoms and never test positive.
But Saturday night, offensive coordinator Kendal Briles called about as good of a game with what he had as possible.
The Hogs hit “explosive plays” (it’s not “chunk” or “big” plays this year). Feleipe Franks connected twice with Mike Woods for 129 yards and two touchdowns. Running back Trelon Smith broke free for an 83-yard touchdown run.
Florida wasn’t going to let Treylon Burks get free. He did end up with three catches for 47 yards, mostly on slant patterns.
When it counted the Hogs couldn’t stay on the field on third down (just 3-of-9) and couldn’t get the Gators off the field on third down (9-of-12).
Plus the special teams questions continued. Not that the Hogs didn’t anything horrific against the Gators, but De’Vion Warren had four kickoff returns for 84 yards. That’s an average of 21 yards per return and you get the ball at the 25 on a touchback, which means they were trying to pop a big play.
Most of the pregame attention was on quarterback Feleipe Franks returning to Florida.
If Franks is as efficient against LSU this week as he was Saturday, the Hogs have a good chance at winning.
His biggest problem is not getting rid of the ball quick enough to avoid sacks. That’s a combination of being stubborn about giving up on a play and an offensive line that isn’t great.
Franks is the best deep passer for the Hogs since Joe Ferguson (and, yes, I’m putting him ahead of Ryan Mallett, who couldn’t drop throws in the tiny holes Franks does). He is not a runner, but he can run enough to turn a zero play into a positive one.
Most of all, though, no game has been too big for him. He’s been there, done that … and won at a high level.
This week he will be the best quarterback on the field against the Tigers.
And that could be enough.










