PEA RIDGE — It has often been said that the most popular sport in Arkansas is football with the second most popular sport being spring football.
Of course, it was mainly referring to Razorback football as spring football for high schools is a relatively new thing for Arkansas. In fact, I don’t believe that the states contiguous to Arkansas have spring football. I know in Missouri the idea was shot down rather quickly as Missouri schools have their state championships in spring sports all the way until the end of May, about the time school is dismissed for the summer. Spring football would have played havoc with track, baseball, softball, soccer and some other sports.
Here in Arkansas, track season is rather short with districts in April and state meets the first week in May.
Missouri’s first district competition is the second week in May with regional meets the following Saturday and the state finals the fourth Saturday in May. Most baseball and softball teams are done by early May.
Back to the locals, Tony Travis’ Blackhawks went through a brisk two-week practice with a record turnout of athletes. Injuries curtailed some players’ experience, but the majority of the boys got a little shot ofexcitement as they look forward to the fall campaign.
The ’Hawks have a lot of experience returning this fall, probably as much as they have ever had. After coming up short by just 5 points to qualify for a playoff spot in 2011, most football observers and prognosticators believe that Pea Ridge will be a playoff team in 2012 with a chance to go deep into the playoffs.
While Travis is not one to make predictions other than “we are going to be better,” he did tell me that he had heard from one sports news outlet that the ’Hawks will most likely be ranked in the top three in the 1-4A poll that comes out this summer.
Most folks think that Ozark and Prairie Grove will be the ones to beat as Ozark, like Pea Ridge, will be returning most of the players. Ozark has made the playoffs the past two seasons with a lot of the same players they will have this year. Prairie Grove? They are always competitive year end and year out and no one expects that to change in 2012.
The ’Hawks return a lot ofexperience in the skill positions like the offensive backs.
The ’Hawks did lose some outstanding linemen from last year but the coaching staff is well on their way to replacing them with some similarly talented players.
I haven’t seen the schedule yet for the fall games, but if there is some carry over from 2011, it might well be that the ’Hawks might get to host the two top teams in Prairie Grove and Ozark. Both those teams hosted Pea Ridge last season.
It was good to see coach Michael Harrod on the field last week. Along with coaches Travis and Caton, these three men represent a ton of winning experience.
I’m thinking I must just have to go out and buy a pickup truck so I can tailgate at Blackhawk Stadium this fall. This well might be the best season I have experienced since I arrived here 14years ago.
Favorable schedule?
I have read several times about how the Razorback football schedule would be most favorable this fall. I didn’t know just how favorable until I actually saw a printed copy in the Democrat Gazette.
In the Hogs’ 12-game schedule, they will only be on the road on three occasions. The three teams they will visit will be Auburn, Mississippi State and South Carolina.
Arkansas won’t leave the state until the mid-season game Oct. 6. The Hogs will get to play eight of the first nine at home, a recipe that gives Arkansas a shot at a high national ranking going into November.
Arkansas takes on defending national champion Alabama in the third game on Sept. 15 in Razorback Stadium. The other big game will be with LSU in the season finale on Nov. 23, also in Fayetteville.
New on the league slate this year will be Texas A&M which recently joined the SEC. Missouri is also a new school in the SEC and is the closest school to Arkansas.
Though it makes sense that Arkansas begins a rivalry with their close neighbor, state league officials decided to put the Tigers in the Eastern Division.
The Hogs’ non-conference opponents include Jacksonville State (Alabama), Louisiana-Monroe, Rutgers and Tulsa. Jacksonville State is a mid-major program most noted for knocking off Mississippi, a defeat which accelerated the demise of former Hog coach Houston Nutt.
Rutgers has the nation’s oldest football program asthey were one of the schools that started the competitions in 1869, just after the Civil War. Most credit Rutgers as being the birthplace of American football.
Rutgers is the largest university in New Jersey and is in fact the State University of New Jersey. The college was founded in 1766 as Queen’s College, right before the American Revolution. After the war was over, the college kind of languished and was close to closing several times. The War of 1812 nearly brought it to ruin but after college officials voted to rename the college Rutgers College, after a local war hero of the Revolution, Mr. Rutger gave the school a rather sizable endowment, thus savingit.
The first ever football game saw Rutgers defeat Princeton 6 runs to 4. Over the years, their football fortunes have come and gone but they are on the upswing. In 2009, Rutgers landed abunch of good freshman athletes and they have been having winning records ever since. These freshman are seniors now so the Rutgers game may not be an easy one for the Razorbacks to handle.
Good ole’ Tulsa is back on the schedule. All through my growing up years, Tulsa could be counted on to be among the Hogs’ first victims of any particular year. The guarantee money kept the Gold Hurricanes coming every year to Razorback Stadium and once in awhile they managed a victory. In recent years, the ’Canes have been much better and have been bowling pretty regularly.
It ought to be a fun fall for Hog and ’Hawk fans.
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Editor’s note: John McGee is the art teacher at Pea Ridge elementary schools, coaches elementary track and writes a regular sports column for The Times. He can be contacted through The Times at [email protected].
Sports, Pages 20 on 05/16/2012