Razorback Football: Wildcats too much for ‘Hammer Down Hogs’

Razorbacks drop road game at Kentucky 24-20

Arkansas loses to Kentucky 24-20 on a full moon, Saturday night in Lexington. Many of us naive fans, myself included, gave us a fighting chance to win this game. We started out strong, as Rakeem Boyd took the ball 74 yards to the house on the opening drive. But alas, them same old Hogs showed up.

Watching Razorback football is like watching a train wreck in slow motion. We all know what the end result is going to be, but we can’t help but be captivated by the journey. Once again, it’s the same song, different verse. The Razorbacks come out and look promising. They get your butt to inch forward to the edge of your seat. But then it happens. For whatever reason, something in the game occurs and causes you to slump back into your chair and fold your arms. Maybe this game it was because of Kentucky quarterback, Lynn Bowden Jr’s performance. Don’t recognize the name? Why would you? He’s a wide receiver / punt returner that Mark Stoops and his coaching staff took in two weeks and retrofit a productive offense around him at quarterback. Razorback fans and that defense will see Bowden Jr in their nightmares as he gashed the Razorbacks defense on the ground for nearly 200 rushing yards and two touchdowns.

I’m exhausted of the excuses. We hear them time and time again, yet nothing changes. Chad Morris and the excuses have fallen on deaf ears. This program has ZERO excuses to have lost the games that it has lost. We were once a program that was revered. We were a program that when it lost to The Citadel, the head coach was immediately fired, because it was unacceptable. Yet when North Texas comes into our house and waxes us off our field, “it is only year one.” Year two comes along with an agonizing defeat at the hands of San Jose State, and “We came in a little too loose.” I’m sorry, what? You are coming off of a 2-10 season and are currently sitting at 2-2, with your only two wins coming against Portland State and Colorado State. How are you too loose? Maybe we partied too hard at “Club Dub.” Regardless, it’s up to the coaches to make sure the players are put in a position to succeed and they’re failing to get it done.

But can we really afford to start over again? Won’t starting over just mean two or three more years of rebuilding? My answer is no. Let me tell you about a program that is not as premier as Arkansas and quite possibly had been in a worse position than Arkansas was.

Insert Louisville. The Louisville Cardinals went 2-10 last year and Petrino left their program in absolute shambles. But guess what? They just upset #19 ranked Wake Forest on the road after losing their starting QB to an injury and are now 4-2 in their first year under a new head coach. Why? Because they hired a guy in Scott Satterfield that had a winning record. He was a proven winner and program builder. Meanwhile, we at Arkansas just keep making excuses for this abysmal coaching staff that shows us their true colors time and time again.

This coaching staff cannot get it done here. It’s time to rip the band-aid off and start over.

The following article was contributed by Matt Grissom.