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Fayetteville

Weekly conference diving honors continue for Schultz

FAYETTEVILLE — For the seventh time this season, freshman diver Brooke Schultz has earned a weekly honor from the Southeastern Conference, being named SEC Female Diver of the Week for the sixth time on Tuesday.

Over the weekend at Houston, Schultz claimed the one-meter and the three-meter titles against the Cougars. On the one-meter, Schultz outscored the field by 15.82 points, winning with a score of 326.70. On the 3m, Schultz broke her own school record for the fourth time this season, scoring a 384.53 and outscoring her opponents by 58.58 points.

Of her 20 six-dive efforts this season, Schultz has 17 first-place showings, having never finished outside the top three.

In dual meets this season, Schultz has yet to finish off the top of the podium, recording 12 first-place performances. She also holds the top scores in the conference on both dives.

Records Broke This Season
Arkansas school record – 1m (twice – 369.90) and 3m (four times – 384.53)
Arkansas pool record – 1m (369.90) and 3m (366.38)
UCLA pool record – 3m (345.20)

Arkansas returns to the pool this Friday, as the Razorbacks travel to Lawrence, Kansas, for their regular-season finale against the Jayhawks.

Razorbacks picked ninth in league in preseason poll

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — In one of the deepest men’s tennis conferences in the country, Arkansas was selected ninth in the SEC coaches’ preseason poll Tuesday.

Texas A&M was selected first by the league coaches, ahead of Florida and Georgia, who tied for second. Arkansas travels to Athens, Georgia, this weekend with the chance of playing the Bulldogs for the first of two times this season in the ITA Kickoff Weekend.

The preseason poll is voted on by the men’s tennis head coach at each institution and is based on a 13-12-11-10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1 vote.

So far this season, Arkansas is 1-2, with two losses to top-20 programs in No. 15 Oklahoma State and No. 18 Oklahoma. To open the season, the Razorbacks defeated the Tulsa Golden Hurricane 5-2.

Prior to head coach Andy Jackson taking over the Razorback program in 2014, Arkansas had finished .500 or better in league play twice — in 1992 (6-5) and 2006 (6-5).

After spending the first two years in Fayetteville near the bottom of the conference, finishing 12th and 13th, respectively, Jackson has turned the Razorback program around, recording two of best conference records in school history each of the last two seasons.

A season ago, the Razorbacks finished tied for sixth in the league with a 6-6 conference record, after being selected to finish fifth in the preseason.

In 2016, the Razorbacks recorded their best finish since joining the SEC with a 7-5 record in conference play, finishing tied for fourth.

Five SEC teams are currently ranked in the top-20 of the Oracle/ITA Rankings. Arkansas plays host to two of the top-three ranked teams in the league, hosting No. 4 Georgia and No. 7 Texas A&M.

The Razorbacks will travel to three of the top-five ranked programs in the conference, going to No. 9 Florida, No. 14 Mississippi State and No. 20 South Carolina.

Preseason Poll
1. Texas A&M              157
T2. Florida                   153
T2. Georgia                 153
4. Mississippi State   132
5. South Carolina      108
6. Kentucky                99
7. Ole Miss                 82
8. Vanderbilt              72
9. Arkansas                66
10. Tennessee              53
11. Alabama               52
12. Auburn                  29
13. LSU                       21

Hogs get third Top 5 ranking from Baseball America

FAYETTEVILLE — With just under a month until first pitch, Arkansas found itself with another preseason top-five ranking.

The Razorbacks will start 2018 at No. 4 according to Baseball America, which released its first national poll of the year this morning.

With Baseball America as the newest of the six polls to release its preseason rankings, Arkansas is ranked No. 6 by Perfect Game, No. 4 by D1Baseball.com, and No. 3 by Collegiate Baseball, its highest preseason ranking since 2013.

Three of the top-10 teams from the Baseball America poll will be coming to Baum Stadium including No. 5 Texas Tech (April 24-25), No. 8 Kentucky (March 16-18), and No. 10 Texas A&M (May 11-13).

Arkansas will also go on the road to face unanimous No. 1 Florida (March 23-25), as well as No. 16 Ole Miss (March 29-31), No. 17 LSU (May 4-6), and No. 23 Mississippi State (April 20-22).

Arkansas is scheduled to open the 2018 season against Bucknell on Friday, Feb. 16 with first pitch at 3 p.m. at Baum Stadium.

2018 Opponents In The Rankings

Team D1Baseball.com Perfect Game Collegiate Baseball Baseball America
Florida 1 1 1 1
Arkansas 4 6 3 4
Texas Tech* 3 4 5 4
Kentucky* 8 8 8 8
LSU 16 12 10 17
Ole Miss 9 11 16
Texas A&M* 10 15 10
Mississippi St. 12 25 13 23
Texas* 21 23 14
South Carolina* 19
Missouri St.* 22

Offensive lineman Heinrich retires due to back injury

Arkansas offensive lineman Jake Heinrich has accepted a medical exemption and will retire from football, he announced Monday.

The former four-star recruit from Urbandale (Iowa) was a member of Arkansas’ 2016 signing class, but did not appear in a game during his two years with the Razorbacks. He redshirted his first year and never cracked the depth chart this past season.

“My time as a football player here in Fayetteville has gone about exactly the opposite of what I imagined it would and I was hoping to right that with a new off-season upon us,” Heinrich wrote in a statement on Twitter. “Unfortunately, after rupturing multiple intervertebral discs in the last few months along and having my spine deteriorated to the point of a senior citizen, according to various doctors, it simply makes sense to accept this new reality for the sake of my long-term health and quality of life.”

Heinrich will get his bachelor’s degree this semester and remain at Arkansas for two more years to go through graduate school. He said former head coach Bret Bielema first approached him about the medical exemption a couple of months ago and that new head coach Chad Morris approved it “with no questions asked.”

Morris, staff recruiting approach getting attention

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Arkansas isn’t going to climb very high into the recruiting rankings this year.

What many fans don’t believe (or refuse to) is they weren’t going to be that high regardless of what coaching staff came in.

Without running off a bunch of players there simply weren’t going to be enough numbers to shoot the Razorbacks into the Top 10.

The guys in Fayetteville who do a great job following all the recruiting stuff have said in a year with normal recruiting numbers (20-25), the Hogs would be ranked in the Top 20 based on the quality they are getting.

Let’s face it, Bret Bielema and the previous staff didn’t run off a lot of players. That wasn’t their style. At Alabama and other places across the league it is not unusual for players to be “encouraged” to transfer if they don’t meet expectations. The coaches actually help them find places more suited for them to contribute more.

Bielema and his staff didn’t do much of that. Whether that was right or not is more for each individual to decide. One way or the other isn’t for everyone.

But what Chad Morris and his staff are doing is drawing attention, both from recruits and others across the league.

For starters, the guess here is their style of play fits more quality players. Let’s face it, there aren’t a lot of high school football teams that still huddle, much less anything else Bielema’s offense did.

On defense, new coordinator John Chavis’ style is more aggressive, which is going to give Hog fans something completely new to look at.

It’s already paying off with four commitments after the first weekend of official recruiting visits. Players committed to other schools flipped to Arkansas, which happens every year. The Hogs have flipped two players from Mississippi State and the players they are getting have been offered by other SEC and Power 5 schools.

That is progress. I doubt Arkansas will ever be a consistent challenger for No. 1 in recruiting, but early appearances are this staff is going to be signing players regardless of their position.

If nothing else, this staff is all over Twitter constantly as they appear to be working the recruiting angle almost constantly.

And that is the biggest positive change. Others are noticing, too.

“This is the hardest I’ve seen an Arkansas staff recruit in years,” was how one former SEC coach summed it up.

Don’t start comparing this staff to what you’ve seen in Razorback recruiting the past 10 years. The impression I always got was they viewed chasing high school youngsters as a necessary evil and viewed it the way NFL teams view the draft.

The results speak loudly. Like a run-of-the-mill NFL team when they caught some breaks, avoided a ton of injuries and the schedule was favorable, well, they had a good record (2010 and 2011).

When all of that went the other way they didn’t.

By all appearances and having covered other teams in the SEC, this staff is taking more of the approach of teams that are at the top of the standings every year.

Getting consistently into the Top 10 every single year in recruiting might be a stretch to expect. That’s why the approach this staff has in schemes, etc., is going to make a big difference.

And I don’t think it’s going to take as long as some do.

Talented running back is fourth weekend commit

Arkansas’ first big recruiting weekend for the late signing period in February has turned out to be a big positive.

Independence (Kan.) Community College three-star running back Rakeem Boyd made his commitment known via Twitter Monday afternoon. Boyd is the fourth recruit from this past weekend to commit since Sunday afternoon.

As a senior out of Houston (Texas) Stratford he signed with Texas A&M. He redshirted there in 2016, then played the 2017 season at Independence Community College.

This past season, Boyd rushed 192 times on 1,211 yards and 14 touchdowns while catching nine passes for 59 yards.

In a 30-20 victory over Northeastern Oklahoma A&M in the Midwest Classic Bowl on Dec. 3, Boyd rushed 35 times for 215 yards and three touchdowns with two catches for 10 yards.

He talked with Hawg247.com’s Otis Kirk about Arkansas and running backs coach Jeff Traylor following his official visit on Sunday:

“Man I had an awesome time with Devwah (Whaley),” Boyd said. “He showed me around. I like Fayetteville. It’s a little bit different from other schools. It’s SEC. Chad Morris is here so there’s a lot of things gonna be changed.”

In addition to Boyd, three other players from visits this weekend also committed afterwards:

• Hewitt-Trussville (Ala.) 3-star safety Myles Mason. He was committed to Mississippi State since Oct. 26.

• New Orleans (La.) Sophie B. Wright three-star linebacker Andrew Parker announced he had committed to the Razorbacks at the conclusion of his visit Sunday.

Owasso (Okla.) 3-star defensive end Courtre Alexander was the first commitment Sunday after his official visit.

Hogs’ women’s team opens season at home Tuesday

FAYETTEVILLE — Coming off the program’s ninth trip to the NCAA Tournament in the last 12 years, No. 18 Arkansas will open its 2018 dual match season Tuesday at home against Tulsa.

First serve is set for 1 p.m. at George M. Billingsley Tennis Center.

Quotable
“It’s always nice to start the spring season at home,” Coach Michael Hegarty said. “Tulsa has another outstanding team this year and these are the kind of quality matches we need early in the spring.”

Promotions
Admission is free. Tuesday’s match will feature complimentary Keurig products, popcorn and Pepsi soft drinks for all fans in attendance.

Live Coverage
Fans can follow Tuesday’s action through live scoring here.

The Series
Arkansas holds a 25-6 advantage over Tulsa in the all-time series dating back to the 1979-80 season. Last season, the Razorbacks defeated the Golden Hurricane, 6-1, at Tulsa.

In The Rankings
One of nine SEC teams featured in the top 25, the Razorbacks’ No. 18 ranking is their highest since opening at No. 14 in 2009.

Individually, senior Léolia Jeanjean is ranked No. 67 in singles and No. 25 in doubles with her partner sophomore Giulia Pairone. Senior Mia Jurasic and junior Ana Oparenovic are the nation’s No. 57 ranked doubles duo.

Hegarty At The Helm
Hegarty is entering his 15th season as coach of the Razorbacks.

Hegarty, who is the program’s all-time winningest coach with 197 victories, has led the Razorbacks to nine NCAA Tournament appearances, including three straight.

2017 Review
Last spring, the Razorbacks’ went 18-10 (7-6 SEC) and defeated 11 teams featured in the final 2017 national rankings, including No. 14 Auburn, No. 16 Texas A&M, No. 21 LSU and No. 24 Tennessee.

Arkansas checked in at No. 19 in the final rankings after holding a spot in the top 20 in each of the last 10 weeks of the season.

Anderson previews tough road matchup with ’Dogs

Arkansas coach Mike Anderson met with the media Monday and talked about Tuesday night’s matchup with Georgia.