FAYETTEVILLE — Arkansas’ John Pelphrey isn’t the first SEC basketball coach to inherit an experienced team, then face a major rebuilding job in his second season.

Pelphrey is just the latest.

Three other current SEC coaches — Alabama’s Mark Gottfried, Georgia’s Dennis Felton and Vanderbilt’s Kevin Stallings — led their teams to the NIT in their first season, then the next year had a losing record or were. 500.

Alabama went from 17-15 to 13-16 with Gottfried; Georgia went from 19-14 to 8-20 with Felton, and Vanderbilt went from 19-11 to 15-15 with Stallings.

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Pelphrey led the Razorbacks to a 23-12 record and their first NCAA Tournament victory in nine years in his Arkansas debut last year, but has lost six seniors and standout guard Patrick Beverley.

Most preseason polls picked Arkansas to finish sixth in the SEC West, and the Razorbacks had to go into overtime to beat Southeastern Louisiana 91-87 in the season opener Friday night.

“It’s a major challenge to go from so much experience to so little experience,” said Felton, whose Bulldogs beat Arkansas in the SEC Tournament title game last season. “There’s no doubt that John has his work cut out for him.

“ As a coach, you just put the blinders on and you plow ahead with incredible persistence.”

Pelphrey started three freshmen and played seven newcomers against Southeastern Louisiana.

Freshmen Courtney Fortson, Rotnei Clarke and Michael Sanchez and junior college transfer Montrell McDonald had a combined 47 points and 27 rebounds against Southeastern Louisiana.

“I think John has proven he’s a terrific coach, and they’ve recruited some great young talent,” Gottfried said. “John’s in a position where he’s got to play those new guys, and they’ll just have to grow up fast for him in our league.”

Gottfried recalled starting four freshman in his second season at Alabama.

“We took our lumps,” he said. “But then when that group of four freshmen became juniors, we won 27 games and won the SEC championship outright.”

Felton said it’s important not to weigh down a young team with too much mentally.

“When you’re going young all of a sudden, I think you have to keep it fairly simple,” Felton said. “Just really hammer away at the few principles that define your team and define your program.

“ Get them to establish those things, then go from there.”

Pelphrey was an assistant coach to Billy Donovan at Marshall and Florida. The two became close at Kentucky, where Pelphrey was a player and Donovan an assistant coach.

“I think John will do a great job, and I think he’s walking into a great situation because when there are no expectations, a lot of times you have a great chance to use that as a way to grow and develop and get better,” said Donovan, who is in his 13 th season at Florida. “I think John went through that as a player.”

When Kentucky was hammered by NCAA sanctions, Pelphrey was among eight scholarship players who remained with the program and guided it back to national prominence.

“The perception was, ‘Geez, Kentucky’s stuck with a bunch of local players that aren’t very good, that were taken because they were just good Kentucky kids,’” Donovan said. “John knows what that feeling is as a player, to be picked last and be the underdog.

“ Then you look at what John did as a player and what that group at Kentucky did, and it’s pretty remarkable.”

Kentucky won the SEC regular-season and tournament titles Pelphrey’s senior year, then reached the NCAA East Regional final before losing to Duke 104-103 in overtime to finish 29-7.

”I think John’s got some great experiences to draw upon, ” Donovan said. “And he’ll have his team improving and growing and developing.”