The Morning Rush is live on a What’s Your Beef Wednesday!!!
Saturday Down South’s Connor O’Gara on SEC meetings in Destin
How playing a nine games every year against SEC teams makes things tougher plus the Nick Saban-Jimbo Fisher feud.
Pig Trail Nation’s Alyssa Orange on softball season-ender plus baseball
Looking at NCAA Regional on the road at Stillwater and looking back at crashing in Super Regional at Bogle Park.
Halftime Pod Presented By Eastside Liquor- Orange, O’gara
Exhibiting Grace Where and When Necessary; Hogs in the Stilly Regional; Jaylin Williams officially turns pro; Softball suffers heartbreaker
Guest- Alyssa Orange & Connor O’Gara
ON HALFTIME: Baseball in Stillwater, softball comes to an end
11:30 – Alyssa Orange
12:30 – Connor O’Gara
Exhibiting Grace Where and When Necessary; Hogs in the Stilly Regional; Jaylin Williams officially turns pro; Softball suffers heartbreaker Call or text, 877-377-6963
Only two Razorbacks make list on first 2023 draft ‘Big Board’
FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — Aside from way-too-early predictions, projecting any ranking of players right now may be jumping the starting pistol a little.
Such is the case with ESPN’s first Big Board for the 2023 NFL Draft.
After months of wondering where Arkansas’ Treylon Burks would be picked (No. 18 by Tennessee), now we can resume normal wondering if the Razorbacks can get anybody picked the next year.
The Hogs don’t have anybody mentioned until position rankings after the Top 25.
Center Ricky Stromberg is the seventh-rated center as the only offensive player making the list and safety Jalen Catalon is projected as the fourth best safety.
Sam Pittman’s team doesn’t have many projected stars coming back for a team that went 9-4 last year making it to the last Outback Bowl (it’s now the Tampa Bowl).
No Razorbacks were listed in Todd McShay’s first way-too-early mock draft for 2023.
Why is all of that deserving of even a mention?
Considering teams that have the most players projected to be high draft picks tend to be playing in championship games, that would explain why the Hogs aren’t getting much love in that area.
All of it’s summer discussion, anyway.
With the SEC having spring meetings this week where a lot of things being discussed, rankings probably won’t be on that list.
But it is a starting point for looking at the teams that have highly-projected players and that list doesn’t include the Hogs.
In case you’re wondering, the top of the first big board is dominated by the usual suspects like Alabama, Ohio State and Georgia.
That likely will be the case when we start rankings, too.
Bud Light Next Morning Rush Podcast: Hogs heading to Stillwater
Tye and Tommy on the Stillwater Regional, Jaylin’s decision, Clay joins and more!
Can Hogs be team that figures it all out at end of season?
FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — Maybe getting a break is the answer Arkansas coach Dave Van Horn has been seeking.
After struggling to the postseason, it’s about the only thing he’s had available.
“You just try to get ’em right,” Van Horn said in a Zoom press conference after drawing a trip to the Stillwater Regional to open play in the NCAA Tournament. “Sometimes it’s nice to not have a schedule.”
He’s been trying to get this team right for a month.
One of the things this team doesn’t have is a vocal leader. A guy that can just take over the locker room isn’t on this team.
“They want to lead by example,” Van Horn said. “We’ve got a lot of leaders. I just don’t know if we have that vocal guy.”
Van Horn knows this team needs to do. He’s just not real sure what he can do to have it start happening.
“We need to just change our mindset a little bit,” he said. “We need to score earlier in these games..
Just over a month ago, fans and the media assumed there would be a regional at Baum-Walker Stadium. That sailed into the ditch along with the Razorbacks in final two series of the year, then couldn’t get out in the SEC Tournament.
Van Horn wasn’t expecting to get a regional. He did think the Hogs would be headed to Stillwater to play in a new stadium that hasn’t hosted postseason play.
And going on the road right now might not be the worst possible thing for this team.
“We want to flip it,” he said. “Maybe going on the road provides less distraction.”
The Hogs have still gotten to Omaha from the road. The initial objective going into every season is still in front of this team.
Some fans determine the entire fate of the program based on every game. This isn’t football. One game doesn’t exactly determine anything in football.
But the road will be tougher. Every team they play in Stillwater got to that point by being a pretty good team.
“You never know how it’s going to go,” Van Horn said.
Which, of course, is the beauty of the postseason in baseball and how teams that get hot and figure it all out at the end can sometimes cause big problems.
Can the Hogs be that team this year?
Hogs headed to Stillwater, will play Grand Canyon on Friday
FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — Since Arkansas didn’t land a host for the first round of the NCAA Tournament, going a couple of hours west was the best option.
But it won’t be easy.
The Razorbacks, struggling down the stretch of the regular season and getting knocked out of the SEC Tournament early, will open the NCAA Baseball Tournament with a game against Grand Canyon on Friday in Stillwater, Okla.
The Cowboys, who will be hosting in a new stadium for the first time, didn’t win the Big 12 Tournament, but will still be hosting the regional.
Other teams coming in will be Missouri State, Grand Canyon State and the Razorbacks.
The Hogs will play a regional in Stillwater for the first time since 2015 and for the fifth time overall. It is in a new stadium, though, so they haven’t played there before.
The Cowboys (39-20) are the host in Stillwater and is the No. 7 overall seed in this year’s NCAA Tournament. The Cowboys will play Missouri Valley Conference Tournament champion Missouri State (30-27) on Friday.
No surprise Hogs won’t be hosting NCAA Regional this year
FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — It shouldn’t have come as a particular surprise Sunday evening when Arkansas wasn’t among the host sites for a regional.
After careening to the end of the season and stumbling through a couple of games in the SEC Tournament, nobody was really expecting it.
With an RPI of 40, the Razorbacks weren’t really close. Texas A&M has the highest ranking of anyone with a 20.
The reasons can be debated later. Playing in-state schools didn’t help, but probably weren’t as damaging as the failure to get big hits down the stretch and the pitching staff collapsing.
That will kill an RPI, even with 38 wins during the season that was comparable with teams hosting regionals.
The losses down the stretch were probably far worse.
A guess here is Hogs coach Dave Van Horn will say they had their chances to win games that would have improved that RPI and he’s absolutely correct on that.
It is the first time since 2015 the Hogs will have to try and get to Omaha starting somewhere other than the friendly confines of Baum-Walker Stadium.
After sweeping LSU at home in mid-April, the Hogs staggered down the stretch. They lost three of their final series of the regular season and did a quick two-step out.
Among the schools selected as host sites, Oklahoma State is the closest in proximity to Arkansas, as Stillwater is just a three-hour drive west from Fayetteville.
That is the destination for the Razorbacks in the projections from Baseball America and D1Baseball that came out Sunday morning.
Four SEC teams — Tennessee, Texas A&M, Auburn and Florida — were selected as regional hosts. Arkansas will not be sent to any of those regionals, but the other 12 are all possibilities.
In addition to Oklahoma State, non-SEC teams selected as hosts include Texas, Virginia Tech, North Carolina, Maryland, Miami (Fla.), Oregon State, East Carolina, Southern Miss, Louisville, Stanford and Georgia Southern.
