Hog Calls : Harrowing task awaits Arkansas
Posted on Monday, March 17, 2008
It’s a harrowing prospect in Raleigh, N. C., playing the nationally No. 1 ranked / NCAA Tournament top-seeded North Carolina Tar Heels.
But the Arkansas Razorbacks would welcome the opportunity. For that matchup means the Razorbacks would have won their first NCAA Tournament game since 1999.
Arkansas, 22-11 and Sunday’s SEC Tournament runnerup in Atlanta to surprise winner Georgia, has been assigned the East Regional ninth seed to play eighth-seeded Indiana, 25-7 of the Big Ten, in Friday’s East Regional first round at Raleigh, N. C.
The Arkansas-Indiana survivor is all but certain to play North Carolina, 32-2 and champion of both the Atlantic Coast Conference season and ACC Tournament, in Sunday’s second round of the 65-team, single-elimination 3-week NCAA Tournament deciding college basketball’s national champion.
North Carolina on Friday in Raleigh plays the winner of Tuesday night’s play-in game between Mount St. Mary’s and Coppin State.
Arkansas, the SEC West runnerup at 9-7, seemed a little wobbly on the NCAA Tournament bubble entering the SEC Tournament.
However, the Hogs absolutely cinched a Big Dance at-large berth by defeating ranked powers Vanderbilt, 17 th, and fourth-ranked SEC regular season champion Tennessee before succumbing, 66-57 Sunday to Georgia, last (4-12 ) in the SEC East during the regular season but the shocking SEC Tournament winner with triumphs in Atlanta over Ole Miss, Kentucky, Mississippi State and Arkansas.
Tennessee, Vanderbilt, Mississippi State and Kentucky joined Arkansas as SEC teams selected at large to the NCAA Tournament with Georgia winning the SEC’s automatic NCAA bid as SEC Tournament champion.
Meanwhile, Indiana went one and done in the Big Ten Tournament, upset, 59-58 by former Kentucky coach Tubby Smith’s Minnesota Golden Gophers.
However at 25-7 overall and 14-4 in the Big Ten, the Hoosiers had no sweat advancing at large to the NCAA Tournament though they have had to sweat an upsetting season.
Head coach Kelvin Sampson was forced to resign amid disclosures of possible NCAA violations regarding impermissible phone calls during recruiting.
Dan Dakich, a former Indiana assistant and player under former Indiana coach Bob Knight and returned to Indiana before this season on Sampson’s staff, was elevated to interim head coach on Feb. 22.
The Hoosiers are 3-3 under Dakich winning home games over Ohio State and Minnesota and at Northwestern and losing at Michigan State and at Penn State and on a neutral site to Minnesota in the Big Ten Tournament.
Indiana is led in scoring by Eric Gordon, a 6-4 freshman guard from Indianapolis averaging 21. 3 points.
Up front, the Hoosiers rely on 6-9, 251 pound senior forward D. J. White, 17. 3 points and team-leading 10. 4 rebounds and 53 blocked shots.
Guards Armon Bassett, a 6-1 sophomore, and Jordan Craw- ford, a 6-4 freshman, also are double figure scorers at 11. 1 and 10. 0.
Jamarcus Ellis, a 6-5 junior swingman, leads the team in assists, 107, and is a force on the boards averaging 7. 2 rebounds and leads the team in steals, 46.
In Atlanta, the Razorbacks before their scheduled flight home were already coming to grips with letting go of their lost chance to win the SEC Tournament to prepare for the Big Dance.
“ We can’t get this game back, ” Arkansas senior forward Sonny Weems of West Memphis told the Northwest Arkansas Times. “ It’s over with. We’ve got to concentrate on what we have in the future. ”
Senior point guard Gary Ervin expressed similar sentiments to the Northwest Arkansas Times.
“ We have to put this behind us, ” Ervin said, “ because we’re preparing for something else. ”
Neither Weems nor Ervin believed the upcoming NCAA Tournament distracted the Razorbacks from their SEC Tournament championship game against Georgia.
“ Tip your hats off to them, ” Weems said. “ They wanted the SEC Championship. We wanted it, too. We weren’t worried about the NCAA tournament or what was on down the road. We just wanted this victory. ”
• • • Nate Allen’s Razorback column appears Mondays in The Daily Record. The opinions expressed are those of the author.
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