There were howls in the hills last week, mostly in reaction to a football team that won 10 games last season and played in a bowl game for the fifth consecutive year.
The group was also stirred by a women's basketball team that won 27 games, a volleyball team that won 28 games and a men's track team that swept its conference meet.
Arkansas Razorbacks? Not hardly.
Arkansas State Red Wolves.
ASU Athletic Director Terry Mohajir and coaches for the Red Wolves were in Rogers Wednesday to mingle with a crowd of about 100 supporters at Northwest Arkansas Core Brewery. ASU fans are excited about the direction of the program and a football schedule that includes games with Auburn, Nebraska, Miami and Alabama in the next three seasons.
Another popular move was adding a four-game, home-and-home series with Memphis beginning in 2020. I'm calling it the "Catfish vs. BBQ" series.
"Even when I played at Arkansas State, Memphis was a big game," said Mohajir, a starting safety for ASU in the early 1990s. "It's good for our fans, it's good for their fans. Their A.D. is a friend of mine, and I kind of hounded him on it until he finally relented."
Mohajir and this group of ASU coaches have no interest in hounding or trying to pressure Arkansas for a game. That's quite a contrast from when I was in school at ASU, where "How Long Will They Run?" T-shirts were a common sight around Jonesboro.
ASU would welcome a game with Arkansas, for sure. But the Red Wolves, who'll host Miami at Jonesboro in 2017, are doing quite well building their own brand.
"We're trying to be the best we can be," Mohajir said. "We've built over $45 million in new facilities, we've doubled our budget, and we're scheduling games that our fans enjoy. We don't worry about anybody else. That's the bottom line."
Unlike the other Division I school in Arkansas, the Red Wolves are willing to play in-state teams, even in football. They'll face Central Arkansas this season and Arkansas-Pine Bluff in 2017.
"If I'm going to spend money to play FCS teams, I'm going to spend money to play the teams in the state," Mohajir said. "That way, the money stays here and everybody benefits."
Arkansas State supporters got to meet the newest addition to the program, men's basketball coach Grant McCasland. The former Baylor assistant hopes to revive a program that had grown stagnant and give in-state players an attractive option to stay home.
He'll also target Memphis, which is a hotbed for basketball talent.
"We've got to do a great job in the state of Arkansas," said McCasland, who was an assistant for five years at Baylor. "I think we offer a lot for kids who are serious about the classroom experience and, ultimately, who want to win championships.
"As far as Memphis, they've got a ton of great talent over there. We had good relationships with people in Memphis when I was at Baylor, and we're going to tap into that."
There's plenty of excitement in football, where the Red Wolves were undefeated in Sun Belt Conference play last season. ASU will face Toledo, Auburn, UCA and Utah State in nonconference games this year, but not before Blake Anderson and Arkansas coach Bret Bielema team up to benefit high school football players in the state.
That'll happen at War Memorial Stadium on June 5 when every college football coach in the state is invited to evaluate the talent.
"It's a prospects camp for any upcoming juniors and seniors," Anderson said. "Bielema has his camps and we've got ours, but this will be a collective effort by all the college coaches in the state to come together and give kids a chance to be seen. To me, it just makes sense, and it's good for the state of Arkansas."
Red Wolves and Razorbacks coming together to benefit the people of Arkansas?
Wow. What a novel idea.
Sports on 05/22/2016