Not surprisingly, the national sports media has failed to note the most obvious story angle arising out of this year’s Final Four: that all of the entries have played important roles in the Razorbacks’ NCAA Tournament history. To correct this egregious instance of journalistic malpractice (and because it’s a really slow time of the year for Hog news), we present this overview of the ways in which UCLA, Memphis, North Carolina and Kansas have either sent our spirits soaring or broken our hearts during March Madness.

UCLA. There’s some room to quibble with the following statement, but one could reasonably say the Bruins are the alpha and the omega of the Razorbacks’ glory years. In 1978, the Hogs arrived as players on the national scene when they knocked off UCLA, which was not far removed from winning an incredible 10 national championships in a 12-year period, in the semifinals of the West Regional. Seventeen years later, the O’Bannon brothers and the insufferable Jim Harrick ended the Razorbacks’ quest for their own back-to-back national championships and closed the door on the magnificient Williamson-Thurman-Beck(-and-Dwight!) era. It doesn’t take the most powerful observational skills to note that Hog basketball has never been the same since.

Memphis. Like UCLA, the Tigers are responsible for a glorious high and a shattering low. Let’s get the bad stuff out of the way first: In 1992, then-Memphis State, led by Anferenee Hardaway, sent the Hogs packing with a second-round, 82-80 win that was sealed with a near-last-second tip-in by Tiger forward David Vaughn.

I’ve tried my best to completely forget about this game, but due to my employer’s poor mental health benefits package, some memories still linger - for instance, the way in which Memphis native Todd Day, obviously seeking revenge for this game, looked like Michael Jordan for the first five minutes of the contest and then proceeded to score something like one point in the last 30 minutes, draw a technical for staring at the ref and foul out.

A truly weird moment took place when Isaiah Morris and Oliver Miller, both sprinting to the Arkansas basket with nary a defender in sight, couldn’t decide who should take the lay-up and passed the ball back and forth until most of the other players began catching up with them. As I recall, one of them finally converted the basket, but they made the play much more interesting than it should have been. We should have known then that the Hogs were in for a long afternoon.

(Read on …)

I think we can all agree that it’s time for a break from the current unpleasantness of Razorback basketball, so with that in mind let’s discuss a more appealing subject: which ex-Hogs should have their numbers retired and jerseys hung from the rafters at Bud Walton? (This topic comes directly from Arkansas Sports 360, which has a good article asking why Arkansas doesn’t retire basketball numbers, so definitely check that out for your background research.)

As a starting point, here’s a very hastily put-together and poorly researched list of possible candidates…feel free to pick it apart and/or suggest your own version in the comments section.

In rough chronological order:

Sidney Moncrief
Ron Brewer
Marvin Delph
Darrell Walker
Alvin Robertson
Joe Kleine
Eddie Sutton
Todd Day
Lee Mayberry
Corliss Williamson
Scotty Thurman
Corey Beck
Nolan Richardson

This doesn’t include the larger-than-lifesize statue of Dwight Stewart that we’re recommending be placed outside the entrance of Bud Walton. That one is such a no-brainer it’s almost not worth mentioning here.

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts…

This picture makes us happy.

It was long overdue, but the members of the 1994 Razorback basketball team got together at the Northwest Arkansas Tip-Off Club today for their first public recognition since winning the national championship. Arkansas Sports 360 has the full story.

It’s January, the basketball team is driving everyone crazy, and Darren and Felix are gone. Perhaps you’ve come to this post looking for something to lift your spirits.

Keep looking.

With it being a slow news day and all, I thought I’d throw this out for discussion: What do you consider to be the most painful Razorback basketball loss?

Although Hog hoops has definitely produced its fair share of heartache, for me the answer is pretty easy: the loss to UCLA in the 1995 NCAA championship game. I so desperately wanted those Hogs to carve out a place in history by winning back-to-back national titles. And after a tournament full of heart-stopping finishes, close calls and plain ‘ole good luck, I was nearly convinced the Razorbacks would complete their quest to repeat when they took the court against the Bruins. Instead, they got beat pretty soundly as Corliss and Scotty both played miserably. (That night launched my intense dislike of Jim Harrick, which proved to be well-founded as the years went by. I watched his demise at Georgia with something close to glee.)

Add in the fact that the defeat marked the end of the most glorious era in Razorback basketball, and surely you can see why I’ve tried to block this game from my memory.

If only I had succeeded.

Because it is the official policy of this blog to feature/link to/talk about Corliss Williamson as much as possible, we thought we’d pass along this video clip from an interview Big Nasty did for the next issue of Arkansas Sports 360:

Oh yeah, they have a clip with Joe Kleine, too.

To be an Arkansas fan is to be convinced that other sports fans and the national sports media don’t give the Razorback program the respect it deserves. I guess it’s in part the consequence of growing up in a small and often-maligned state.

In the fall of 1994, however, as the Hogs were gearing up to try to defend the national basketball championship they had won months earlier, the sports media was anything but dismissive of the Razorbacks. In fact, at least one writer was heaping an amount of praise on them that looks pretty over-the-top 13 years later.

In an edition of Sport magazine that I bought in the fall of 1994 and rediscovered during a recent visit home, Darryl Howerton penned an article entitled, “Hog Wild: Arkansas is Loaded with Pro Prospects, and the NBA is Waiting with Open Arms.”

Here’s a sample paragraph: ” Arkansas’ team photo looks more like an NBA scouts’ most-wanted list than a collegiate squad. If you didn’t know better, you might think the 1994-95 Razorbacks were one of the new expansion clubs joining the NBA next fall.”

Here’s another: “‘To give you an idea of how loaded Arkansas is, let’s just say I can kill six or seven trips around the country by going to just one game in Fayetteville,’ says an NBA Western Conference scout.”

(Read on …)

* Um, maybe we weren’t clear enough about this, but we want Marcus Monk wearing a red jersey, not a red shirt. That’s right - the “r-s” word is being thrown around now, which is officially very bad news.

* The Heisman race is shaping up to be pretty weird this year. Wondering where D-Mac stands after the Hogs’ 2-2 start? The Heisman Pundit breaks it all down here and here.

* The RazorBloggers have some tidbits on the football powerhouse that is UT-Chattanooga.

* Is the famous McFadden stiffarm really powerful enough to knock a defender’s helmet off? The Hog Blogger proves that it is.

* In recruiting news, HawgsIllustrated has an interview with future Razorback Devin Thomas.

* Lastly, three good items from the Slophouse: Sacramento Kings owners donate $10k to Arkansas Baptist in honor of Big Nasty, Patrick Beverley rated the 6th best college shooting guard, and Arkansas-LSU is rated one of the best college football rivalries (which seems weird…somebody must have been swayed by the groovy boot trophy).

Corliss Williamson made his Razorback debut on Dec. 2, 1992, and appeared for the last time in an Arkansas uniform on April 3, 1995. In between, Big Nasty and Co. treated Hog fans to the most outstanding and exciting era in the basketball program’s history.

In Part 1 of our tribute to the recently-retired Williamson, John provided a top-notch overview of Corliss’ college and pro careers. In part 2, I’ll nerd out a little bit and look at some of Big Nasty’s most memorable games as a Hog. This is a topic that I could go on about for far too long and bore many people to tears. To keep the post somewhat manageable, I’ve decided to focus on three games from each of Corliss’ three seasons on the Hill.

Let’s get this party started, shall we?

1992-93

* Arkansas 81, Memphis State 76; Dec. 2, 1992; Fayetteville - Darrell Hawkins (20 points) and Roger Crawford (18 points) received most of the credit for this rousing, come-from-way-behind upset of the No. 8 ranked Tigers, but Corliss, in his first game in a Razorback uniform, showed that he was more than capable of living up to the considerable hype that accompanied his arrival on campus. Before having to leave the game in the second half with a broken foot, Corliss scored 13 points and grabbed 6 rebounds to help the unranked Hogs, who trailed by as much as 20 points in the first half and 14 points at halftime, get the post-Day-Mayberry-Miller era off to an unexpectedly good start.

* Arkansas 101, Kentucky 94; Feb. 10, 1993; Fayetteville - In his sixth game back since returning from his foot injury, Corliss scored a then-career high 22 points and grabbed eight rebounds to help No. 14 Arkansas defeat the No. 2-ranked Wildcats. The Hogs held a 13-point lead with just less than five minutes to go, but Kentucky came back to narrow the deficit to within four with more than a minute remaining. However, Big Nasty hit some key free throws and threw down one monster slam dunk over Jamal Mashburn to help the Razorbacks hold on for their last victory over a ranked opponent in Barnhill Arena.

(Read on …)

As you’ve almost certainly seen by now, Corliss “Big Nasty” Williamson retired from the NBA yesterday. He won’t be far from the basketball court, though, having already joined Arkansas Baptist as an assistant coach.

For anyone who followed college basketball in the 90s, the name Big Nasty conjures up images of low post dominance, clutch plays and most of all, many, many wins by the Razorbacks. Corliss was an all-everything high school player coming out of Russellville in 1992 (skip to 1:10 in this clip), and when he signed with the Hogs he seemed like the perfect piece to continue the winning ways of the Day/Mayberry/Miller era. Little did we know what was in store…

Although he missed a good chunk of his freshman year due to an injury, he quickly made his presence felt, meshing with fellow newcomers like Scotty Thurman, Corey Beck and Dwight Stewart, plus cagey vets like Darrell Hawkins, to make Arkansas the surprise of the SEC that year. In what was expected to be a rebuilding season, the Hogs went 22-9 and advanced to the Sweet Sixteen, where they lost to the eventual champs, North Carolina.

Every Razorback fan knows what happened the following season: The Hogs as a team, and Corliss in particular, were unstoppable, going 31-3 and beating Duke for our only undisputed major sport national title. Of course none of that would have happened without Big Nasty, who made the leap from young player with promise to dominant national star. Nolan Richardson’s teams had always been known for great guard play, but he’d never had a low post weapon of Corliss’ caliber before and it made all the difference - simply put, when Corliss got the ball near the basket, he was going to score. End of story.

Returning all five starters, the Hogs were a marked team the next year, but they were almost as good, going 32-7 and advancing again to the Final Four, where they beat North Carolina and then lost to UCLA in the championship game (a loss that still burns me to this day). Following his Razorback days, Big Nasty went on to a solid but not-quite-spectacular NBA career. Being a 6′6″ power forward in the pros is a tough gig, so he completely rebuilt his game from the ground up to become a basket-facing small forward - a very impressive achievement (and tribute to his work ethic) that he never got enough credit for. Following this reinvention, he didn’t do too shabbily - winning the Sixth Man Award in 2002, earning a championship ring in 2004 with the Detroit Pistons and posting a career scoring average in the double digits.

I’ll go on record as saying that Corliss is my all-time favorite Razorback in any sport. He was a home-grown Arkansas kid who led the Hogs to unprecedented national success. He was all ferocious intensity on the court and all class off it. Plus, it didn’t hurt that his era coincided with the peak of my own Razorback fandom…Stephen and I certainly spent many hours in college nerdily discussing and dissecting the Hogs during those days. Lots of good times and good memories there. So Corliss, thanks for everything and best of luck at Arkansas Baptist and beyond.

(coming up in part 2: Stephen looks back at some of Big Nasty’s greatest games)

We’ll have plenty more to say about the football situation later this week, but in the interest of keeping things from getting too dark and depressing I wanted to share this video. In it, Corliss is apparently being interviewed as part of some local UALR-affiliated charity bowling tournament. It’s awesome on at least four or five different levels.