Not only will Texass fail to cover, they'll fail to win. Hogs want this game more than the shorthorns. Hogs by 7. Read if you want...
By KEITH WHITMIRE / The Dallas Morning News
FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. – Arkansas coach Houston Nutt knows all the coaching clichés: Treat every opponent the same. Don't get too high or too low. Take them one game at a time.
But mention Texas, and the reverence in his voice says it all. He gets excited about facing the Longhorns, and isn't afraid to admit it.
"Oh, absolutely," Nutt said. "It goes back to the fact you're raised with it, you're born and bred with it."
Playing Texas on Saturday, for the first time in a regular-season game since 1991, has put an extra beat in this up-tempo coach's step this week. It's a reflection of his Arkansas heritage, although his players don't have the same ingrained emotions about Texas.
Nutt grew up in Little Rock and played for Arkansas under Frank Broyles and Lou Holtz.
When Nutt flashed the upside down Hook 'em Horns sign after beating Texas in the 2000 SBC Cotton Bowl, it wasn't the coach of the University of Arkansas doing it. It was the little boy whose father took him and his brothers to games to root on the Hogs.
Nutt later apologized to Texas coach Mack Brown and says he doesn't blame him for using Nutt's gesture as motivation. Nutt said he probably would, too.
"The thing that he [Brown] doesn't understand, not being from Arkansas, is I grew up [going to Arkansas-Texas games], as early as I can remember," Nutt said. "That was such a big, big rivalry. If you look at the series, Texas has dominated the series. (Texas holds a 54-20 edge)
"But if you looked around the stands, from the age of 4 on, it was always that ..."
Nutt flashes the upside-down Hook 'em sign, but this time without cameras around to record it. He thought he had the same discretion back in January of 2000, when most of the Texas fans had vacated the Cotton Bowl after a 27-6 defeat.
"Our fans still are celebrating, 45,000-plus, and all of them are doing this," giving the Horns-down gesture again. "All I did, in an emotional, joyous time, not as a put-down to a Texas fan or to rub their noses in it, all I did was answer the fans. It wasn't a 30-minute deal, go around the stadium and do it in a fan's face. That's what bothers me about that."
Anti-UT T-shirts
It doesn't bother Nutt that people are excited about playing Texas again. Thousands of Arkansas fans are expected to watch the game, played in Austin, on the giant video screen at Donald W. Reynolds Stadium.
A visit to Big Red's souvenir shop finds two different anti-Texas T-shirts, each with derogatory slogans, for sale. Inside the Broyles Athletic Center, athletic department staffers are wearing "Beat Texas" buttons.
There's even a display case in the Arkansas football museum titled "Hogs vs. Horns: The Rivalry," and the "The" is underlined.
Featured in the display is a quote from Holtz: "Don't you people ever get emotional about Rice or Baylor or Tech? All I hear is that gosh-darned Texas."
The Texas-Arkansas rivalry has literally been a museum piece since Arkansas left the Southwest Conference to join the Southeastern Conference after the 1991 season.
Arkansas' players were in elementary school the last time the teams were in the same conference. Most of them have grown up without a Texas game to look forward to. Only a few fifth-year seniors were part of the 2000 Cotton Bowl squad that played Texas.
"At the Cotton Bowl, we were being redshirted," senior linebacker Caleb Miller said. "They played so many old Texas-Arkansas highlights that we couldn't help but know the history now, because they played it at every single function we were at. I was like, 'OK guys, it's getting old now.' "
Running back Cedric Cobbs was the offensive MVP of that Cotton Bowl game. If the players didn't know about the rivalry before, Cobbs said the Razorbacks' fans will give them a quick education.
"People would come to me and say, 'Beat Texas. You have no idea how much this means.' " Cobbs said. "It's just been numerous times, especially older people."
Knowing the Texas game can inspire passions and media attention, Nutt has cut off interviews with players after Tuesday, and practices are closed after the first 30 minutes. Normally, practices are open, even to the public, and players are available through Thursday.
Nutt's place in history
Nutt also knows what beating Texas can do for his program and for his place in Arkansas history. Even the legendary Broyles was just 5-14 against Texas. Holtz was 2-5, and Ken Hatfield, who took Arkansas to six straight bowl games, was 2-4 against the Longhorns.
"Any time you play Texas, no matter when it is on the schedule, it's an awesome opportunity," said Nutt, who is 1-0 against the Longhorns.
Broyles, now Arkansas' athletic director, said he senses a difference in Nutt.
"He's worried," Broyles said. "It's a Texas week."
Broyles recalled being greeted by thousands of fans at the airport after a win over Texas. He knows what beating Texas means to an Arkansas coach.
"It means everything," Broyles said. "When you're able to defeat a team like Texas that has consistently over 80 years been a football power, you gain prestige, you gain something that you will talk about the rest of your life."
As of Monday, Nutt had not talked much about Texas to his players. He did not want his players looking past last week's opponent, Tulsa, whom Arkansas defeated, 45-13.
But Nutt's players have gotten a sense of what playing Texas means to him.
"It's kept within himself because he doesn't want to get too excited," offensive tackle Shawn Andrews said. "But I know deep down inside him, he really wants to win this game. For the team and for the rivalry."
