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Razorbacks looking for any positives while fans looking for new coach

Ed Orgeron can’t win Saturday night and he knows it while Barry Lunney, Jr., can’t lose, but he knows any positives makes him a winner while Hog fans just want a new coach.

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Ed Orgeron can’t win Saturday night and he knows it while Barry Lunney, Jr., can’t lose, but he knows any positives makes him a winner while Arkansas fans are more worried about who is going to be the new coach.

Relax. Nobody knows who the new coach is going to be for the Razorbacks.

For LSU tonight it’ll be Lunney.

You can listen to the game right here on HitThatLine.com if you live in the River Valley and Northwest Arkansas or over the air at ESPN Arkansas 95.3 in the River Valley, 96.3 in Hot Springs and 104.3 in Harrison-Mountain Home.

Arkansas GameDay starts at 1 p.m. with the Hogs’ broadcast starting at 3 p.m. ahead of the 6 p.m. kickoff.

One positive thing about Hunter Yurachek is he’s basically plugged up leaks coming in the search and the only thing that’s really come out lately is Memphis’ Mike Norvell is apparently more interested in the Florida State job than coming to Fayetteville.

It’s highly doubtful this job is the hot commodity fans are trying to convince themselves it is, as I pointed out on Friday.

Lunney got appointed as the interim coach when Yurachek finally threw in the towel on an 18-game tenure that was continuing to show each week how everybody tried an experiment with a coach who ultimately couldn’t even handle the basic press conference like an SEC coach.

You won’t hear from this corner that Morris took a team that should be contending for the SEC West title and managed to coach them to a 4-18 record.

The Hogs should have won six last season and be sitting on at least seven right now.

You wonder now if Morris actually lost the team after his first game when a starter went into the transfer portal and upperclassmen basically lost interest.

New coaches have to show some form of improvement and the only thing that improved was Morris’ complete inability to coach at the SEC level. He was about perfect in that, being unable to prepare, motivate or develop players.

About the only positive thing he managed to do was set up the next coach with some pretty good players on campus with 17 redshirt freshmen coming back from one of the better recruiting classes in recent years.

Lunney will get to play a lot of those guys against LSU on Saturday night.

But they won’t be enough to win. I’m not even sure they’re enough to still be within a range to keep the Tigers’ starters in the game in the second half.

They might be able to stay within the spread, however, which is a whopping 42.5 points at the ESPN Pick Center.

While he refused to say it, Lunney will likely start freshman K.J. Jefferson at quarterback, making it a full seven different starters behind center over the last two years.

Morris couldn’t make up his mind at the most important position on the field, so Yurachek took away that torment for him.

If Jefferson manages anything offensively early against a top-ranked LSU team that’s weak point is the defense. Yeah, I’m as surprised to type that as you are to read it.

This may be like the Alabama game in 2018. The Hogs put up the most amount of yards and points on Crimson Tide before they were demolished in the national title game.

Orgeron will get no credit from the fans or the college football playoff committee for this game, regardless of the score.

LSU 58, Arkansas 34


Easy pickings

Alabama over Western Carolina, Auburn over Samford, Kentucky over Tennessee-Martin, Vanderbilt over East Tennessee State and Mississippi State over Abilene Christian.

Seriously, you still think playing nine SEC games in a year is ridiculous when you look at that lineup of games?


Texas A&M at Georgia (-13)

Jimbo Fisher is in his second season in College Station and things are not going as planned.

Being a 13-point underdog is not what the Aggies faithful had in mind when they committed $75 million to Fisher last year.

This was almost in the Easy Pickings category, but then this whole exercise would have been far too short.

Look for the Bulldogs to cover in this game, mainly because they didn’t have a particularly good game against Auburn in last week’s win.

Georgia 31, Texas A&M 10


Tennessee at Misouri (-3.5)

No, seriously, the Tigers are favored at home in this one, which means the general public hasn’t accepted that the Vols are improving every week while Mizzou is positioning for a season-ending pillow fight in War Memorial Stadium.

For a team that’s not eligible to go to a bowl game this season, if they can get up for this game there might be a different outcome, but I think they have cratered for the year.

Tennessee has made rapid improvement this year … in the second year of the Jeremy Pruitt coaching tenure.

They keep getting better.

Tennessee 28, Missouri 14

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2024 Razorbacks Football

Thu, Aug 29vs UAPB (Little Rock)W, 70-0
Sat, Sep 7@ Oklahoma StateL, 31-39 2OT
Sat, Sep 14vs UABW, 37-27
Sat, Sep 21@ AuburnW, 24-14
Sat, Sep 28vs Texas A&M (Arl)L, 21-17
Sat, Oct 5vs TennesseeW, 19-14
Sat, Oct 19vs LSUL, 34-10
Sat, Oct 26@ Mississippi StateW, 58-25
Sat, Nov 2vs Ole Miss11:00 AM
ESPN
Sat, Nov 16vs Texas11:00 AM
Sat, Nov 23vs Louisiana TechTBD
ESPN+/SECN+
Sat, Nov 30@ MissouriTBD
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2024 High School Rankings

Following is the Arkansas Sports Media High School Football Poll including the Overall Top 10, the top five in Classes 7A, 6A, 5A, 4A, 3A and 2A, plus the top three in the 8-man division, as voted by a panel of sports media from around the state for the week ending August 24. Ranking is given with first-place votes received, records, total points and ranking from last week's poll:
OVERALLRecordPtsPrv
1.Bryant (18)8-02521
2.Conway (6)8-02302
3.Greenwood (2)8-02103
4.Little Rock Parkview7-11714
5.Bentonville5-31416
6.Benton7-11265
7.Fayetteville6-21008
8.Pulaski Academy6-2757
9.Rogers5-3459
10.Shiloh Christian6-24010
Others receiving votes: Marion 13, Valley View 9, Joe T Robinson 8, Mountain Home 4, Cabot 3, Elkins 3.
CLASS 7A
1.Bryant (20)8-01241
2.Conway (6)8-01052
3.Bentonville5-3753
4.Fayetteville6-2455
5.Pulaski Academy6-2354
Others receiving votes: Rogers 5.
CLASS 6A
1.Greenwood (26)8-01301
2.Benton7-11022
3.Shiloh Christian6-2713
4.Marion7-1524
5.Mountain Home7-131
Others receiving votes: Little Rock Catholic 4.
CLASS 5A
1.Little Rock Parkview (23)7-11271
2.Joe T Robinson7-1902
3.Valley View (3)8-0803
4.Hot Springs Lakeside7-1484
5.Farmington7-130
Others receiving votes: Camden Fairview 4, Maumelle 4, Morrilton 3, Greenbrier 2, Harding Academy 1.
CLASS 4A
1.Elkins (19)8-01161
2.Arkadelphia (5)6-2792
3.Little Rock Mills (1)8-0703
4.Warren6-2404
5.Malvern (1)8-0315
Others receiving votes: Dardanelle 22, Southside Batesville 11, Mena 8, Bauxite 7, DeWitt 4, Highland 2.
CLASS 3A
4.Bismarck (15)8-01054
5.Fordyce (4)8-0765
Prescott (3)7-1531t
1.Osceola (2)6-149
3.Mayflower (1)8-036
Others receiving votes: Booneville (1) 31, Rivercrest 19, Mansfield 14, Charleston 4, Rison 3.
CLASS 2A
1.Carlisle (21)8-01211
2.Conway Christian (4)8-01042
3.Des Arc7-1663
4.Bigelow (1)6-2455
5.Murfreesboro6-230
Others receiving votes: Marked Tree 10, Mineral Springs 6, Junction City 5, Cross County 1, Mount Ida 1, Poyen 1
8-MAN SANCTIONED
1.Strong-Huttig (25)5-0761
2.Midland (1)7-0502
3.Cedar Ridge7-1253
Others receiving votes: Rector 5.

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ESPN ARKANSAS 99.5 IN FAYETTEVILLE, 95.3 IN THE RIVER VALLEY, 96.3 IN HOT SPRINGS, 104.3 IN HARRISON-MOUNTAIN HOME.