FAYETTEVILLE -- Back in August it seemed Texas A&M today might personify to new Razorbacks Coach Chad Morris what SMU personified in 1998 to then new Razorbacks Coach Houston Nutt.
"Just beat SMU," University of Arkansas alums pleaded after Danny Ford was fired and Nutt hired.
Not as urgently but with genuine hope, "Please beat Texas A&M" is an Arkansas plea that Morris understood shortly upon arrival and into the preseason standing a decent chance to fulfill.
Now it appears far less doable. The 1-3 Razorbacks are 20-point underdogs going into today's SEC game against the Aggies at the Dallas Cowboys' AT&T Stadium.
Old Arkansas Southwest Conference rival A&M has won six consecutively from Arkansas since the Aggies forsook the Big 12 for the SEC .
Old Arkansas Southwest Conference rival SMU, still rebuilding in the 1990s from the NCAA "death penalty" completely shuttering its football program in 1987 and '88, was for eight years resurrected nonconference to the Razorbacks' schedule upon Arkansas' 1992 move to the SEC.
Arkansas' brass back then presumed SMU easy pickings. Every other year visiting the Mustangs in Dallas would allow the Razorbacks game day recruiting presence in the DFW Metroplex before the UA's biggest alumni base away from Arkansas, still UA enticements playing in Texas today.
It didn't work out vs. SMU like Arkansas planned. SMU swept Arkansas from 1995 through 1997 even with Ford's 1995 Razorbacks eventually winning the SEC West.
The 1996 and '97 losses to SMU especially embarrassed during 4-7 seasons prompting those "Just Beat SMU" pleas.
Nutt's first year ending in unexpected 9-3 SEC West co-championship glory began with Arkansas fans as immediately elated with a Game Two 44-17 slamming of SMU in Little Rock as with the next's week 42-6 SEC stunner over Alabama in Fayetteville.
Now Arkansas fans' expectations seem dipped below even the "Just Beat SMU" level of preseason 1998.
The inevitable summer lift accompanying an enthusiastic new coach yields to reality. That reality is last season's 4-8 overall/1-7 in the SEC end of the Bret Bielema era didn't remotely bequeath Morris the talent that Ford bequeathed Nutt.
Favored Arkansas losing nonconference both at Colorado State and badly to North Texas in Fayetteville drove reality home.
Daubers were so down that last Saturday's 34-3 SEC opening loss at then No. 9 Auburn was regarded as an Arkansas improvement. Other than disasters on special teams, it was.
But Arkansas prospects today still loom grim. Just compare losses.
The 2-2 Aggies earlier this season played then nationally No. 2 Clemson to the wire in a 28-26 loss and lost by less to No. 1 reigning national champion Alabama than Arkansas did to North Texas.
Ironically a Texas A&M grad and SMU's coach the past three years, Morris strives building on improvements displayed against Auburn trying to aim the Razorbacks believing they can break the A&M chain like the 1998 Hogs broke through on SMU.
Sports on 09/29/2018