Hog Calls

Good facilities not a key to success

An artist's rendering shows what a proposed expansion to Donald W. Reynolds Razorback Stadium in Fayetteville might look like. The UA athletics department estimates the project would add about 4,800 seats and cost $160 million. (Photo by Razorback Athletics)

FAYETTEVILLE -- "Build it and they will come" doesn't necessarily correlate to "build it and we will win."

It's not correlating lately in Arkansas football and basketball.

Despite the first year-round availability of the Basketball Performance Center and its practice facilities that men's Coach Mike Anderson and women's Coach Jimmy Dykes and their immediate Arkansas coaching predecessors deemed a must, the programs wallow a combined 1-7 in the SEC.

The Fred Smith Football Center became a reality for Coach Bret Bielema but obviously made no difference when the Razorbacks lost 24-7 and 24-0 halftime leads losing their final two games 28-24 at Missouri and 35-24 to Virginia Tech in the Belk Bowl at Charlotte, N.C.

Even Dave Van Horn, the impervious to losing baseball coach with 13 NCAA Tournament berths including four College World Series during his first 13 Arkansas years, last season suffered a 7-23 season in the SEC.

The Hogs wallowed despite having an all-weather indoor infield to practice on at the Fowler Training Center.

The recent disconnect between state-of-the-art facilities and some team performances should have Athletic Director Jeff Long and new Chancellor Joe Steinmetz fretting if indeed lifelong Arkansan David Pryor knows more about Arkansas than they do after all.

Pryor was the lone Board of Trustees member to argue strongly against the ongoing project that has knocked down the Broyles Athletic Center and will add 3,000 luxury seats to Reynolds Razorback Stadium at an estimated cost of $160 million, a cost Pryor fears could climb considerably higher. Expanding anything football right now other than victories isn't apt to sit well with disgruntled Razorbacks fans.

That said, an SEC program isn't going to succeed operating out of Fred Sanford's junkyard.

As the graduate assistant distance coach to former Arkansas Coach Ed Renfrow, John McDonnell started putting the Razorbacks on the national track map with distance great Niall O'Shaughnessy when they didn't have on-campus facilities.

McDonnell didn't start consistently winning conference and national championships until he got both tracks and improved upon them at the championship pace that he, successor Chris Bucknam and Women's Coach Lance Harter have set.

Bielema at Wisconsin and off his second- and third-year progress at Arkansas before this past season's faltering finish, and Anderson at Alabama-Birmingham and Missouri and just two seasons ago going 27-9 at Arkansas, have histories to rely on turning it around.

Van Horn's record incredibly speaks success 13 times out of 14.

Dykes, a novelty to the women's game having previously assistant coached only men, did advance his first Razorbacks team two seasons ago two games deep into the NCAA Tournament.

All certainly could build off what they have.

Now this adage comes with the pressure building on what has been built: "Be careful what you wish for because you just might get it."

Sports on 01/14/2017