It was a day of reflection for former University of Arkansas, Fayetteville athletes Monday afternoon at the Southwest Conference Hall of Fame induction ceremony.
Fred Marshall, who was the quarterback of Arkansas' 1964 national championship team, still can't believe how the Razorbacks went on to win college football's top prize 53 years ago.
"What in the world? How do you go from 5-5 to 11-0 and the national championship?" Marshall said at the Embassy Suites in Little Rock. "One [reason] is coaching. The other is senior leadership."
Marshall and 13 others were inducted into the Southwest Conference Hall of Fame on Monday. It's the fourth year that the Little Rock Touchdown Club has helped host the conference's Hall of Fame ceremony that honors past Razorbacks.
The 2017 class of former Arkansas athletes and personalities included Marshall; football players Jim Benton, Ronnie Caveness Sr., Joe Ferguson, Steve Little, Wear Schoonover, Billy Ray Smith Sr. and Dennis Winston; basketball players Ron Brewer, Amber Shirey and Darrell Walker; track and field stars Edrick Floreal and Cynthia Moore; and former Arkansas Gazette sports editor Orville Henry.
The SWC dissolved in 1996, and its property rights were transferred to the Texas Sports Hall of Fame. In 2013, the Southwest Conference Hall of Fame was created.
Arkansas was the only non-Texas school in the conference during its heyday.
Ferguson, a first-team All-Southwest Conference quarterback in 1971 who passed for 4,431 yards at Arkansas (1970-1972), said he was grateful for football.
"If it wasn't for throwing a football, I wouldn't have been able to go to college," said Ferguson, who played 18 seasons in the NFL (Buffalo, Detroit, Tampa Bay and Indianapolis).
Winston, a linebacker from 1973-1976 and two-time Super Bowl champion with the Pittsburgh Steelers (1978, 1979), couldn't believe he was being inducted into the Southwest Conference Hall of Fame when he received a call from former Arkansas quarterback Bill Montgomery earlier this year.
"Bill? Bill Montgomery?" Winston said about his phone call with Montgomery. "I almost hung up on him. How did you get my number?"
Walker -- the Southwest Conference Player of the Year in 1983 who spent 10 years in the NBA with New York, Denver, Washington, Detroit and Chicago -- recalled a meeting with a fan, a native of Newport, in Atlanta recently when the fan came to him and asked whether he was Darrell Walker.
"He said, 'I can't believe I'm here with Darrell Walker,' " Walker said. " 'Me and my friend used to go in the backyard all the time. I was Alvin Robertson and my friend was Darrell Walker.'
"I'm telling this story just to let you know the passion of the Razorbacks fans. Wherever you go and see Razorbacks fans, they'll let you know and acknowledge you."
Sports on 10/31/2017