By Otis Kirk
FAYETTEVILLE — Arkansas will get the 2022-23 season going on Monday night with an exhibition game against Rogers State at 7 p.m. in Bud Walton Arena.
Eric Musselman has coached 101 games at Arkansas and his team has advanced to the Elite Eight the past two NCAA Tournaments. Musselman talked about how his team got to this point and how he plans on sustaining success in the future.
“I think just coming every day understanding there’s a process,” Musselman said. “In the summer it’s a process. Once the season hits, it’s a process. Right now in college basketball or college football, whatever, you always have to have a short-term plan, and then you also have to have a long-term plan that has some type of sustainability, however you’re going to — whatever that sustainability is going to be for a long-term plan.
“We feel like we’ve had three really good years, but in today’s world it’s what are we going to do the next game and then the next game after that and just try to take each game as they come on the schedule. And then the biggest key is how do you improve as a team throughout the course of a season.”
Arkansas is ranked No. 10 in the first preseason AP Poll. Kentucky is No. 1 and there’s five schools from the SEC in the Top 25. Texas A&M is No. 26 so just outside the top group.
“I think the league is phenomenal,” Musselman said. “Star players. Players that are going to play in the NBA, you look at the NBA Draft the last few years. Incredible coaching. As a league, if you have really good coaches and you have NBA-level talent and then you have institutions that have great credibility nationally, I know that the SEC is an incredible football conference, but it’s also an incredible basketball conference.
“You know, every single night that you play somebody, that particular team in our conference can beat anybody. Not just in conference, but anybody in our league I think could beat anybody nationally as well. It’s a difficult conference to play in and win at a high level.”
The Hogs already played four games in Europe in August and then the Red-White game was this past Sunday. Musselman was asked about the Arkansas baseball team playing some Texas Rangers prospects as he prepares for Rogers State and Texas prior to the season opener and if such thing was possible in basketball?
“I think that — I mean, everything right now is evolving, but obviously the baseball that you are referring to — because I do have some friends that work with the Rangers’ Minor League system, and most of those guys — a lot of those guys were younger even than the college guys,” Musselman said. “So the way that the baseball format is set up is just you can’t equate the Dominican League and some of the different things, having three levels or maybe four, I guess, if you go rookie ball, instructional league. And in basketball there’s just the G League basically. I don’t think really — it doesn’t line up like college baseball teams playing one of the younger Minor League group of players.
“But I do think the international stuff that we were able to do this year is great from a lot of things. It breaks up the monotony of what I think is way too long of an offseason in college basketball. The playing a charity exhibition is going to be really, really good. I’m glad that we’re able to did play another Division I team.”
On Saturday, Oct. 29, the Hogs will play Texas in Austin for a key preseason game prior to Monday’s season opener against North Dakota State.
“For us that particular game against Texas is extremely important,” Musselman said. “Coach (Chris) Beard does a great job. His teams are overly physical. This year’s Longhorns team has got really an experienced team. You look at their back court, and I don’t know how old Marcus Carr is, but I remember him at Minnesota, and they have some transfers that are really, really experienced.
“And for our young guys, that’s a great opportunity for us to go have tape to fall back on. No different than coaching in an NBA exhibition game. That game is not going to count on your record whether you win or lose. So it’s a great — it holds great value to us because we can look at different combinations and maybe some things that we wouldn’t do in a regular season game.”
Musselman has 11 new players among his 13 scholarship athletes. He has said he needs to be patient with this group. Heading into Monday’s exhibition game how is the patience coming along?
“I am trying hard,” Musselman said. “We have slowed down our teaching to a snail’s pace at times. Patience is going to be a word all year long because 6 out of 13 freshmen is a lot. It’s new for me. It might not be new for maybe some other coaches in college, but it is new for me.
“We’ve historically had a veteran-laden team, whether it was at Arkansas or even Nevada. But our teams also have tended to get better as the season has progressed, and you would think with six young players — and it’s not just the six freshmen. You know, Brazile, a transfer from Missouri, has only played one year of college basketball. Ricky Council is still a young player.
Across the board we’re really, really young, and hopefully we get better, but I think patience is a word that we use oftentimes in our staff meetings (smiling).
Arkansas was 28-9 in 2021-22.
