Van Horn: ‘We didn’t give ourselves a chance to win’ against Little Rock
Arkansas coach Dave Van Horn wasn’t pleased with his team’s performance, especially at the plate, in the 17-7 loss to the Trojans on Tuesday night.
Hogs can’t slow down Little Rock in whopping 17-7 loss Tuesday night
FAYETTEVILLE — Little Rock defeated Arkansas, 17-7, Tuesday night at Baum-Walker Stadium in the first-ever meeting between the two programs.
It’s Arkansas’ second midweek loss of the season and the first time its suffered back-to-back losses.
Although four different Razorbacks recorded multi-hit games, the offense didn’t manage more than seven hits for the final six innings and leaving the bases loaded in the fifth. Arkansas left 14 runners on base in the game, tying a season-high (Western Illinois – March 13).
Trevor Ezell led all Razorbacks with a 3-for-5 game after batting in the leadoff spot for the first time this season. It was his first three-hit game since Feb. 27 against Memphis and ninth multi-hit game of the year.
Heston Kjerstad, Matt Goodheart and Jack Kenley also had two hits each. Kenley drove in three of Arkansas’ runs including a solo home run in the eighth inning, his sixth of the year which ties for the team lead with Casey Martin.
Freshman starting pitcher Patrick Wicklander looked good through the first two innings, allowing just one hit and two baserunners. However, in the third inning, the Razorbacks suffered their first of a season-high four errors after Christian Franklin dropped a pop fly in shallow left field that led to three unearned runs.
Wicklander had racked up five strikeouts before the third inning. It was his second-straight start with five as he finished the game with 3.1 innings pitched with three hits allowed and all three runs coming unearned.
Arkansas got an early 2-0 lead in the second inning after a two-RBI double by Martin, his only hit of the game. But, Little Rock responded with a three-run third inning, two coming off the bat of Nick Perez, who doubled home the second and third runs for the Trojans, giving them their first lead of the game.
It looked like the game was going to be a back-and-forth slugfest when Arkansas scored four more times in the bottom of the third to take a 6-3 lead.
Three of the four runs came off singles by Goodheart and Jack Kenley. Goodheart finished the game 2-for-5, his seventh multi-hit performance in his last 12 games.
Little Rock responded a second time in the fifth inning when Troy Alexander hit a grand slam off Kole Ramage to take a 7-6 lead.
It was the last lead change of the game.
The Hogs got the bases loaded with nobody out in the bottom half of the fifth, but were unable to punch in any runs.
Up next
Arkansas hits the road for its first Thursday-Saturday series in conference play when it travels to 10th-ranked Auburn at Plainsman Park.
Game one is set for Thursday at 6:30 p.m. on ESPNU, while game two will be at 6 p.m. on SEC Network+.
The series finale will have first pitch at 2 p.m. and be broadcast on SEC Network+ as well.
Hicks, quarterbacks plus offensive linemen as offense wins Tuesday
It was the offense’s first time to win the belt for a spring practice Tuesday as Chad Morris said later Ben Hicks is making a big difference, taking charge during the drills.
PHOTOS BY ANDY HODGES | HITTHATLINE.COM
Morris talks about offense winning belt for first time in spring
Razorbacks coach Chad Morris said for the first time in spring practice the offense captured the belt and talked about Ben Hick pulling unit together.
Gafford named honorable mention All-American by AP on Tuesday
FAYETTEVILLE — Arkansas’ Daniel Gafford picked up a pair of national honors as he was voted Associated Press All-America honorable mention and named to the CollegeInsider.com Lefty Driesell Defensive All-America Team.
Gafford becomes the 29th Razorback to be named All-America and the 14th to make an AP All-America squad. Gafford is the first Razorback to be named to the Lefty Driesell Defensive All-America Team, an award that began in 2010.
Gafford’s honor comes after he was tabbed consensus first team All-SEC — just the sixth Razorback to be such honored — and being voted to the SEC All-Defensive Team, joining LSU’s Tremont Waters as the only players to be both consensus first team All-SEC and be named to the SEC All-Defensive Team this season.
A native of El Dorado, Gafford finished fifth in the NCAA in field goal percentage (.660) and led the SEC in the category by 95 percentage points over Tennessee’s Grant Williams (.565).
Gafford was one of two players in the NCAA (Gonzaga’s Brandon Clarke) to average at least 15.0 points, 8.0 rebounds and 2.0 blocked shots while shooting at least 60 percent from the field.
In the SEC, Gafford was the only player to rank among the league’s top five — much less top 10 — in scoring (4th; 16.9/game), rebounding (2nd; 8.7/game), field goal percentage (1st; .660), blocked shots (3rd, 2.0/game), offensive rebounds (2nd; 2.8/game) and defensive rebounds (3rd; 5.8/game).
In addition to blocking 2.0 shot per game (65 total for the season), Gafford led the Razorbacks with 151 deflections on the defensive end — 36 more than the next closest on the team.
Gafford finished his two-year Razorback career with 955 points, averaging 7.4 rebounds, a .635 (second-best in school history) and 141 blocked shots (sixth-best in school history).
Storms named SEC’s top pitcher after complete game shutout over Kentucky
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — Autumn Storms was selected as the SEC Pitcher of the Week after a 3-0 performance last week, including a complete-game shutout of Kentucky last Friday.
The weekly accolade is the second of Storms’ career.
Storms’ shutout against the Wildcats was the first for the Wildcats this season. She went on to only allow two runs in game three of the series, helping the Razorbacks to their sixth-straight conference home series win.
Storms started the week with a win over Sun Belt opponent UT-Arlington, where she allowed only four hits and struck out five Mavericks. Over the course of the week, Storms tallied 12 total strikeouts.
The Temecula, California native faced 94 batters and recorded only one true walk through 20.2 innings pitched. She currently ranks in the top 50 of four categories among Division I pitchers including victories, walks allowed per seven innings, strikeouts and strikeout-to-walk ratio.
Since becoming a Razorback, Storms has recorded 325 strikeouts; Storms’ 116 strikeouts this season are already a single-season career high.
Up Next
Arkansas will start a four-game road stretch on Wednesday when they travel to Missouri State for a non-conference mid-week game with the Bears.
After Wednesday’s contest, the Razorbacks will head south to Gainesville, where they will kick-off a three-game series with Florida starting Friday at 5 p.m.
Bud Light Morning Rush Podcast: Tuesday
John Nabors & Tommy Craft discuss selling the Arkansas program to coaches, Eric Musselman rumors, plus Aaron Torres!
Could Nevada’s Musselman be Hogs’ choice if Sampson not interested?
With every passing hour there is no announcement that Houston’s Kelvin Sampson is the new Arkansas coach, you have to wonder if there’s a different focus and if the focus is on Nevada coach Eric Musselman.
After the Cougars were eliminated by Kentucky in the Sweet 16 last week, every Razorback fan started the clock, watching intently for an announcement.
One that hasn’t come from anyone official.
Musselman is a name that’s been whispered by numerous people for nearly a week now.
After a couple of stints in the NBA that were rather unremarkable, he worked first at Arizona State, then LSU before going to Nevada as the head coach in 2015 and in four years he’s won at a 76.4 percent clip.
He’s had the Wolfpack in the NCAA Tournament for three of his four years. The first year he had a 24-14 record and won the CBI Tournament. Okay, that’s not even the NIT, but it’s in the record and with that record in a major conference they would have been in the NCAA.
The Hogs likely weren’t going to look at a Rick Pitino, for a variety of reasons … pick one. Chris Beard isn’t leaving Texas Tech for Arkansas. He’s a Texas guy and might go to the Longhorns, but that’s a big question mark, too.
Because of Hogs athletics director Hunter Yurachek’s relationship with Sampson, everyone assumed that was a deal done months before the firing of Mike Anderson last week.
If there was a deal — and no one has any evidence I’ve seen there was one — for whatever reason it fell completely apart. Probably because Houston has some boosters who can pony up the financial resources to make the Cougars an attractive job.
All of that leads to Musselman, who is 54 years old, has worked in the NBA and as an assistant at the top college levels. Reportedly he was one of the keys to LSU landing Ben Simmons.
He’s won everywhere he’s been … except in the NBA.
Like I said, that’s not a negative from this corner. Pitino and Calipari didn’t win in their trials in the NBA, either.
You can see on his resume why he might be an attractive choice.
Whether he’s the first choice or not.
???? Monday Halftime Pod — featuring Arkansas legend Sidney Moncrief
Phil Elson & Tye Richardson discuss the coaching search, interview Arkansas legend Sidney Moncrief, plus the guys recap their weekend!
