Riding the D train

BY DAVID SHOWERS Northwest Arkansas Times

Posted on Monday, November 5, 2007

URL: http://www.wholehogsports.com/nwat/58980/

Beating South Carolina Saturday night at Donald W. Reynolds Razorback Stadium made Arkansas bowl eligible.

Where Arkansas will be going is still unclear, as a complex calculus must unfold before the bowl selection committees can extend invitations.

“ It gets rather comical sometimes, ” said Jack D-Arcy, a member of the Chick-fil-A Bowl’s marketing and selection committee, of the selection process. “ You need a computer and a genius to sort out all these possibilities.

“ We have to wait for people to play themselves in or play themselves out. If you don’t get six wins, you’re not even considered. If you get six wins, you will be considered along with everybody else who gets six wins. ” D-Arcy was one of several bowl representatives watching Arkansas’ win Saturday from the comfort of the Jackson T. Stephens Media Center. Envoys from the Capital One Bowl and PetroSun Independence Bowl were also present. The representatives said projecting which teams will go where is folly, particularly amid the unpredictability that’s ruled college football this year. Decisions won’t be final until after the conference championships games Dec. 1. “ It’s too early, ” said Kurt Putberg, a member of the Chick-fil-A Bowl’s marketing and selection committee. “ Not just in the SEC, but nationally this has been a real strange year. So much can still happen. It’s still way early. ” Capital One Bowl committee member Lonnie Young’s mere presence spoke to how fluid college football has been this season. Arkansas and South Carolina came into their meeting lacking the credentials to merit an invitation to the Capital One Bowl, which has the contractual right to invite the SEC’s first non-BCS selection. Typically the team that loses the conference championship game is invited. Neither Arkansas or South Carolina appeared poised to advance to the title game before their meeting Saturday, but that didn’t stop Young from scouting them.

“ Neither team’s been mathematically eliminated [from winning their division ], and you’ve seen how many upsets there have been this year, ” he said. Young said he visited with several Arkansas fans who attended last year’s Capital One Bowl in Orlando, Fla., where Wisconsin defeated Arkansas 17-14. He said the fans’ willingness to travel made Arkansas an attractive candidate. “ You always look for how well a team travels, ” Young said. “ We sold out last year. Everyone I talked to told me how much fun they had at last year’s bowl. ”

Arkansas fans came en masse when the Razorbacks played in the PetroSun Independence Bowl in 1991 and 2003. Jimmy Hagan, a member of the Independence Bowl selection committee, said Arkansas brought more than 20, 000 fans to Shreveport, La., both times. The eighth-place teams from the SEC and Big 12 are invited to Shreveport.

“ There’s a huge Razorback fan base in southern Arkansas that doesn’t always get up to Fayetteville to watch games, ” he said. “ Their proximity to Shreveport works out for them to travel well. ”

Hagan spoke with the school’s alumni association before Saturday’s game and said many of the group’s members expressed their concerns about limited hotel space. He and the other bowl representatives also met with Arkansas and South Carolina’s chancellors, presidents and athletic directors.

“ We do a lot of marketing and public relations, ” he said. “ We met with the alumni group to answer their questions about hotel space. Many of them said they had trouble finding hotels in 2003. Since then, more than 2, 000 additional rooms have been built in the area.

“ I think the date, Dec. 30, works out well. It’s between Christmas and New Years, so all the hotels won’t be snatched up for New Years. ”

Putberg and D-Arcy said how many fans a school can bring isn’t a criterion in the Chick-fil-A Bowl’s selection process. They said the bowl, which typically invites the fifth-place teams from the SEC and ACC, enjoyed record attendance in 2006 and has sold out the Georgia Dome in Atlanta the last 10 years.

“ We don’t worry about how many people a team will bring to the game, ” Putberg said. “ In the past that’s how bowls used to make a lot of their decisions. That’s not something that’s as prevalent for us anymore. We always look for the most attractive matchup. ”