Awhile back, it dawned on us here at RazorbackExpats.com that the Arkansas basketball program has a very special anniversary coming up this spring. Thirty years ago this March, Eddie Sutton led the Hogs to the Final Four, marking the school’s first modern-era appearance in college basketball’s showcase event. Whit E. Knight, one of our favorite commenters and an occasional contributor, has commemorated this seminal event with a three-part series. In this final installment (click here for the first and here for the second), he recounts the Hogs’ five games in the 1978 NCAA Tournament. Many, many thanks, Whit. Once again, the stage is now yours:

Arkansas’s first-round game in the NCAA tournament was in Eugene, Ore., against unranked Weber State, which had finished the season with an impressive winning streak and its conference tournament title. Weber State kept it close early, but Brewer finally began penetrating the Wildcats’ zone, and with U.S. Reed and little-used Alan Zhan getting extended playing time while Moncrief and Schall were on the bench in foul trouble, the Hogs pulled away to a 73-52 victory. Delph finished with 20 points, Brewer 19 and Moncrief 16. The Arkansas Gazette noted that the game was remarkable for one thing: an almost total lack of intensity. That would soon change.

Next up was 10-time NCAA champion and No. 2-ranked UCLA in Albuquerque, N.M. It is hard to realize today just how daunting the game must have seemed to the Hogs and their fans. As Counce said, “From the time I was 7 until I was 17, UCLA was the national champion every year but one.”

The deck headline in the Gazette sports section the day after the game said it all: “Hogs Display Courage, Poise in Record Win.” Arkansas led by 10 at the half, but was down by two with 7:34 to go. The Razorbacks shook off the memory of their collapse against Wake Forest the previous year, steadied themselves, regained the lead and answered every UCLA threat the rest of the way to prevail, 74-70.

Delph, who had been snubbed out of high school by UCLA, which had no interest in a 6-4 center from Conway, was 10 of 11 from the field in the first half and finished with 23 points. He and Brewer, who scored 18, played the entire 40 minutes. Moncrief, who tallied 21, played all but the last few seconds. He had to leave the game after he suffered a mild concussion, jammed finger on his left hand and considerable bruises on his shoulder and neck when a hard foul from 6-9 All-American David Greenwood sent him crashing to the floor. Counce played 39 minutes. With Schall again on the bench with four fouls, Zahn contributed a solid 21 minutes.

It was the most physical game the Hogs had played all year, but even though they were a finesse team, they were clearly the better squad and deserved to advance. This game announced to the world that Arkansas now belonged among the elite in college basketball.

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Awhile back, it dawned on us here at RazorbackExpats.com that the Razorback basketball program has a very special anniversary coming up this spring. Thirty years ago this March, Eddie Sutton led the Hogs to the Final Four, marking the school’s first modern-era appearance in college basketball’s showcase event. Whit E. Knight, one of our favorite commenters and an occasional contributor, will commemorate this seminal event with a three-part series that will run on Wednesdays. In this second installment (click here for the first), he recounts the thrilling 1977-78 regular season. Many thanks, Whit. The stage is now yours:

In 1973-74, the last year that Lanny Van Eman coached the Razorbacks, a U of A student could walk up right before game time, flash her student activity card and basically have her choice of seats to watch the Arkansas basketball team play.

Not in 1977-78.

Now the Hogs were playing before packed crowds, both at home and on the road. A preseason exhibition game in Little Rock (albeit against the Russian national team) was sold out.

The previous year, the Razorbacks had caught everyone unaware. Sutton said that even he didn’t realize how good the team was until after the season. But his success was forcing the other Southwest Conference schools to hire better coaches and recruit harder to catch up. The talent level in the league was definitely up, and the Hogs would not be sneaking up on anyone this year. In addition, Arkansas’s non-conference schedule was brutal.

Arkansas began the season ranked No. 7 in the AP poll and No. 9 in the UPI (coaches’) poll, where they got one No. 1 vote. After an opening victory against Missouri State, the Hogs traveled to Little Rock to face Mississippi State, who would end up finishing second in the SEC, considered one of the strongest basketball conferences. Arkansas whipped the Bulldogs, 94-61. Hmm, maybe the Southwest Conference wasn’t just Houston and bunch of football schools after all.

The Hogs continued to cruise through their non-conference schedule. After topping Oklahoma and Kansas, they advanced to No. 3 in the polls, which is where they stood when they topped LSU in Baton Rouge, 67-62, in late December.

On New Year’s Eve, they took on Memphis State in Memphis and whipped the Tigers, 95-70, getting revenge for the previous year’s loss. Brewer had 26 points, “some of which were difficult to believe even after seeing them,” according to the Arkansas Gazette’s David Smith. Schall added 20, and Counce, playing before his hometown fans, shut down the Tigers’ leading scorer. Moncrief and Delph also had big games.

Two days later, the football Razorbacks shocked Oklahoma in the Orange Bowl in one of the greatest upsets in college football history. It was beginning to look like the stars were aligned right for Arkansas.

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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…

Here now is the second and final part of our Q&A with Eugene Nash, the late ’70s and early ’80s walk-on who captured the hearts of Razorback fans like few players before or since. (For Part 1 and a more complete introduction, just click here.) In this installment, Eugene discusses the most painful loss and the most exhilarating win of his Hog career, who would win a game of one-on-one between him and Jimmy Dykes, and why — to paraphrase country singer Mac Davis — happiness means having Lubbock, Texas, in your rear view mirror.

Who were the three best players that you played with at Arkansas?

Oh gosh! It’s easy - Sidney Moncrief, no doubt about it. He had the tenacity to be a great player. Maybe not the best shooter, but when the time came, you wanted the ball in his hands and him defending the best player. No doubt him – the distance between him and the rest was pretty far. I think Scott Hastings and U.S. Reed would be the next guys, but Sidney was a good distance ahead of the next group.

A lot of it had to do with Sidney’s heart - he had a big heart. He was married at the time and lived off-campus so it was harder to get to know him, but he made an effort to spend time with all of us, invited us over to dinner, things like that. Steve Schall was like that too.

Give us some insight into the personalities on those teams - who was the funniest guy?

I’d say Scott Hastings. He taught you a lot about life in general. He was funny and did stuff you didn’t even know was possible.

What was the most enjoyable road trip that the team took? And, conversely, what town did you guys dread visiting?

The place that you really hated to go to was out to Lubbock, to play Texas Tech. That was the only place they sent us out to dinner without curfew - there was nothing to do! We saw one dog walk across the street, that was it.

By 10:00, everything was closed - we’d be back in our rooms early on our own. That was the only place they gave us the keys and just said, “Go get a bite to eat.”

Playing in those SWC tournaments in Dallas was always exciting. You always looked forward to that.

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A few weeks ago, we asked for your help in tracking down former walk-on Eugene Nash, one of our all-time favorite Razorbacks. We’re happy to report that, thanks to the subsequent tips, we were able to do so. Today, Nash lives in Fayetteville and is a national account manager for Tyson Foods, for which he has worked for 25 years.

A native of Tyronza, he played for the Hogs from 1978 to 1982 and despite (or, at least in part, because of) his infrequent playing time, he captured the hearts of Razorback fans like few players before or after. The waning moments of blowout wins were inevitably accompanied by booming crowd chants of “Eu-GENE! Eu-GENE!” When Coach Eddie Sutton would put Nash in the game, the crowd would go nuts.

We spoke last week with Nash, and he spun many a good yarn about his time on the Hill. Below is the first installment of a two-part Q&A, in which Eugene discusses how he became a Razorback, how Sidney Moncrief inspired him to stay on the team, why Coach Sutton resembled the Godfather, and, of course, his famous dunk and the resulting t-shirts.

Coming out of high school, did you have any scholarship offers from other schools?

I had a scholarship offer to go and play at Arkansas State, which is around my hometown. From there, I had some smaller offers like Arkansas Tech and Arkansas-Monticello, but my mindset was that I wasn’t thinking NBA or anything like that. I wanted to go to the University of Arkansas and have employers in job interviews see that on my resume, but I still wanted to pursue my dream of playing college basketball.

Before leaving for Fayetteville, I sent a letter to the coaching staff saying I wanted to come out for the basketball team. They sent a letter back saying they’d never taken any walk-ons, but said I could stop by the basketball office and have a tryout.

Tell us about the tryouts.

The first day, there were about 100 guys who showed up. They put us through different drills, ran us really, really hard, and split us up into different teams and let us play. On the second day, about half of those guys didn’t come back. A few of them probably figured, “What the heck, this isn’t what I want to do.”

It’s tough when you try to walk-on. The tryouts were like an all-star game. Everybody was trying to show off their skills; people shot the ball as soon as they crossed half-court. At the time, I was a pretty good jumper for a 6’1” kid so I could block shots and rebound. I figured I’d defend and rebound and let them see how well I could perform without shooting the basketball.

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I recently came across these photos of a nine-year-old, bowl-cutted me taken at a Razorback autograph session and, needless to say, got a good laugh out of them. The pictures were taken in the summer of 1982 in downtown Little Rock. The photo in the upper left corner is me with, of course, then-Coach Eddie Sutton (my frownish look is because I was embarrassed that my dad was taking our picture). The upper right shot shows Alvin Robertson signing an autograph for me, and the bottom left photo is me with Darrell Walker (my dad had asked Darrell to put his arm around me, and he doesn’t appear to be too thrilled to comply). Finally, the bottom right shot is of Sidney Moncrief, by then one of the best players in the NBA. One of my favorite things about these pictures: Alvin’s collared camouflage shirt. The autographs are after the jump.

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