HOG CALLS

Timing is right for enshrinement of McFadden, Jones

Arkansas running backs Darren McFadden (5) and Felix Jones (25) celebrate during a game against South Carolina on Saturday, Nov. 3, 2007, in Fayetteville.
Arkansas running backs Darren McFadden (5) and Felix Jones (25) celebrate during a game against South Carolina on Saturday, Nov. 3, 2007, in Fayetteville.

FAYETTEVILLE -- Now that Darren McFadden has joined Felix Jones in NFL retirement, it perhaps behooves the Razorbacks lettermen and letterwomen of all sports to vote them simultaneously into the University of Arkansas Sports Hall of Honor.

The Hall of Honor induction ceremonies are during its Aug. 31 banquet, the night before the Razorbacks kick off the 2018 football season against Eastern Illinois at Reynolds Razorback Stadium.

Running backs McFadden (Pulaski Oak Grove) and Jones (Washington High in Tulsa, Okla.) excelled together as Razorbacks from 2005-07 and turned pro together in 2008. Both had fine NFL careers.

Jones played through 2013 as a running back and kick returner for the Dallas Cowboys and Pittsburgh Steelers.

McFadden retired Tuesday after 10 years running the ball for the Oakland Raiders and Cowboys.

While both were good NFL players and first-round draft choices, they are regarded as legends in Razorbacks lore.

Jones surpassed the 1,000-yard mark twice as a runner, was an All-SEC selection, made the All-America first team as a kick returner and was the 2007 SEC Special Teams Player of the Year.

McFadden ranks among the greatest, if not the best Razorback of all-time. In three years he scored 41 rushing touchdowns, won two Doak Walker Awards, was twice runner-up in the Heisman Trophy voting and amassed rushing yard totals of 1,113, 1,647 and 1,830 in three seasons.

Above all, especially during the Razorbacks' 2006 SEC West championship soap opera of a season, fast friends McFadden and Jones epitomized unselfishness and teamwork by always complementing and complimenting each other.

Honoring the greatest Razorback duo of recent past would be a fitting start a new regime in 2018.

Enshrining them together seems an appropriate must. Not since All-American "Smackover" Scott and "Muscles" Campbell, who starred for John Barnhill's 1946 Southwest Conference champion team has an Arkansas duo been so productive as a team.

Mom, pride and eating together

On coach Mike Anderson's Miked Up radio show Monday night, Arkansas freshman forward and Little Rock Mills alum Darious Hall described the essence of the unselfish team basketball Anderson stresses.

"We all eat if we all play together," Hall said.

For Hall and senior guard Daryl Macon, becoming a Razorback was as natural as state pride and parenthood.

"It was always my dream to become a Hog," Hall said. "It made my mom proud and I feel like everyone in Little Rock, Arkansas, is behind me."

Macon feels more bonded to the state than ever during his second Razorbacks season after spending two years at Holmes Community College in Goodman, Miss.

"I grew up a Razorback fan," Macon said. "And after two years in junior college I wanted my mother to see me play."

Sports on 12/02/2017

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