LITTLE ROCK — A nugget buried in some smack talk, plus Chad Morris’ 16 years as a Texas high school coach adds up to a good reason for fans to be excited about Morris replacing Bret Bielema as Arkansas’ football coach.
Flash back to July 2015 when Bielema - seven months removed from pounding Texas in Houston - touted his run-based offensive philosophy at a Texas high school coaches convention and supposedly told the coaches “he’d kick their asses” if they didn’t play with a fullback or if they threw 70 times.
Two months later in Fayetteville, Texas Tech coach Kliff Kingsbury, son of a Texas high school coach, invoked Bielema’s phrase during his assessment of the Red Raiders' 35-24 win over the Razorbacks, and jabbed at Bielema by saying 90 percent of Texas high schools run the spread.
If that number is anywhere near accurate, few athletes in Texas were prepared or eager to participate in Bielema’s offense.
On the other hand, Morris should be able to recruit Texas better than Arkansas has in years. He has cultivated relationships with high school coaches for two decades and his spread and up-tempo approach is familiar to multitudes of coaches and players.
Also worth noting is that Morris had recruiting coordinator Mark Smith, making the transition from SMU to Arkansas, with him on the private plane that flew the new coach to Fayetteville. Smith, like Morris, is a former high school coach in Texas.
The roster in the UA media guide lists 15 players from Texas and the Razorbacks need at least twice that number to be successful. Morris said Thursday that Arkansas should be able to sign 10 players a year from Texas.
During the days that Gus Malzahn dominated speculation about Bielema’s successor, many assumed the Auburn coach would be able to recruit the same type players to Fayetteville that he had signed at the school in the southeast corner of Alabama.
More than once last Saturday night during the Pulaski Academy-Little Rock McClellan Class 5A championship game, I argued that Auburn’s roster is loaded with athletes from Alabama, Georgia and Florida, and that even Gainesville, Fla., is only a five-hour drive.
Malzahn might have persuaded an occasional player to follow him to Fayetteville, but Atlanta is 10 hours from the Arkansas campus, Gainesville is 15 hours, and proximity is a big deal for players and their families. In turn, that means Texas and Louisiana are logical hunting grounds for Razorback recruiters.
Considering SMU’s speed of play, a tip for Arkansas’ offensive linemen — slim down to improve quickness. Only two years ago, Arkansas’ offensive line was on the cover of the media guide and every assessment of the Razorbacks’ offense included a mention that the line was the biggest in all of football.
Not in 2018.
In 2017, SMU was 25th in the country, averaging almost 77 snaps per game and Morris mentioned “break-neck speed” on Thursday.
Knowing that, consider the weight of some of Arkansas returning underclassmen offensive linemen who started on occasion in 2017 — Colton Jackson (298 pounds), Hjalte Froholdt (311), Zach Rogers (309), Johnny Gibson (333), Paul Ramirez (308) and Brian Wallace (337).
Only three of the 14 offensive linemen on the SMU roster weigh 300 and the heaviest is 310.
Expectations that Morris’ offense will duplicate the success enjoyed at SMU are unrealistic. For one thing, teams in the American Athletic Conference are about offense first. Defense is a priority in the SEC.
In fact, SMU was eighth in the country in scoring, averaging 40.2 points per game, but three other AAC teams were also in the Top 10. Meanwhile, four of the top 16 scoring defenses were in the SEC, including three in the SEC West.
In addition, personnel available at Arkansas were not recruited for Morris’ offense and Razorback shortcomings on defense are many.