With 10 regular-season games remaining, all SEC games, the Arkansas Razorbacks have little wiggle room if they want to be in the NCAA Tournament.
The Hogs have only two games left with teams possessing a better RPI -- South Carolina (17) and Florida (12) -- and both games are on the road.
A victory in either of those games would definitely move the Razorbacks up from their current RPI of 29.
Losses to other teams on the schedule could hurt badly.
Alabama still has games against Arkansas -- tonight in Bud Walton -- South Carolina and Kentucky, which has an RPI of 5 despite losing to Kansas at home Saturday. The Jayhawks, mysteriously, are No. 6 in the RPI, which is why the selection committee doesn't lean as heavily on the RPI as it once did.
The Ratings Percentage Index is a scale used by the NCAA Selection Committee to rank Division I basketball teams by their performance in light of strength of schedule. Low RPI ranking numbers denote strong teams; high numbers denote weaker ones.
Yet, that doesn't mean tonight's Tide-Hogs game isn't important; in fact, it's almost critical.
The Tide are 6-2 in SEC play, the Hogs are 5-3. While Alabama's RPI is 79, it really has only one bad loss, and that was to the Texas Longhorns, 77-68. The burned oranges are in next to last place in the Big 12 with an 8-13 overall record and 2-6 in conference play.
Alabama's 84-64 loss to Auburn was an embarrassment. The Tide's other SEC loss was to Florida.
In nonconference, Alabama lost to Dayton, which is still in contention for the NCAA Tournament; Valparaiso, which is probably going to win the Horizon League; Oregon, which has na RPI of 10 and is in second place in the Pac-12; and Clemson, which is part of the highly respected ACC.
Alabama has a chance to move up, and a victory tonight would put it on the NCAA Tournament radar.
A Hogs' victory could move them up a bit and put them a little closer to March Madness. Experts currently have them a No. 9 or No. 10 seed.
No team can really afford a collapse during February's frenzy.
The Tide are a significant challenge tonight because of their contrasting style. Arkansas likes to push the ball. Alabama is much more deliberate, but that's by design and not choice.
When Avery Johnson took over as the Tide's head coach last season, he said he'd like to score every five seconds, which is what most coaches with his resume -- 16 years in the NBA as a player, a 440-254 record as an NBA head coach, including a trip to the NBA Finals in 2006 -- would say.
The faster, the better.
Apparently, all those years as a player and head coach in The League taught Johnson you have to adjust to your talent. This Crimson Tide team needed to be more patient. More cautious. More attentive to detail.
The Tide are averaging 69.1 points per game, which ranks 273 out of 347 teams that play on college basketball's highest level. The Razorbacks are No. 36, averaging 81 points per game.
Tempo will determine the winner tonight.
That doesn't mean the Tide will walk it up the court and pass a dozen times. They will take what Arkansas gives them, and if the Razorbacks are as timid on defense as they were against Oklahoma State on Saturday they will be in trouble.
The Tide get after it on defense -- they are averaging 6.8 steals per game -- and they are willing to gamble.
They also have three road victories in conference play, though no one has ever accused Mississippi State, LSU or Georgia fans of rivaling the Hog callers when they show up and get into the game.
Arkansas needs to put Saturday's loss out of its collective mind. The Hogs have 10 games left, and that light at the end of the tunnel isn't a train. It's an invitation to the NCAA Tournament.
Sports on 02/01/2017