With Arkansas mired in the muck of a 1-6 start to SEC play, first-year coach John Calipari sent out a motivational text to his team with a message of inspiration that could essentially be boiled down to this: If you’re going to have success, you must go through failure.
“That’s what we were dealing with,” Calipari said after Arkansas closed out Texas for a 78-70 win Wednesday night. “We lost a bunch of games.”
But in less than a week, the Razorbacks’ slop has given way to glimpses of a hog heaven that Arkansas fans envisioned when they hired a Hall of Fame coach away from Kentucky.
Following consecutive convincing Quad 1 road wins over Kentucky and the Longhorns, the Razorbacks (14-8, 3-6 SEC) are suddenly back in the NCAA Tournament picture.
“In this league, two road wins?” Calipari said. “It tells you we’re not too bad.”
Once left for dead on the roadside shoulder in one of college basketball’s all-time toughest conferences, the Hogs are now trotting into a Saturday showdown against No. 3 Alabama with a realistic shot at earning an invitation to the Big Dance.
Can Arkansas make the NCAA Tournament?
As of Thursday, seven of Arkansas’ final 10 games are Quad 1 opportunities, which gives the Razorbacks an excellent chance to continue adding ammunition to their resume. Even a 4-5 mark in their final nine games could be enough to get the Hogs on the right side of the NCAA Tournament bubble depending on how things play out in the SEC Tournament and for other bubble teams.
A 4-5 finish would leave Arkansas at 18-13 (7-11 SEC) entering the postseason. If the Razorbacks went 1-1 in the SEC Tournament and entered Selection Sunday at 19-14, they would be short of the 20-win benchmark. That’s an important distinction, since reaching 20 victories wasn’t enough for teams like Oklahoma, Seton Hall and Pitt last season.
All three had either 20 or 21 victories but were left among the “first four out” of the final 68-team field in 2024.
The difference between Arkansas and those teams could be two-fold. The Razorbacks would almost certainly have more Quad 1 wins than Oklahoma, which went 4-12 in such opportunities last season. Also, they wouldn’t have a single Quad 3 loss provided that they handle LSU at home next Wednesday. Pitt and Seton Hall each suffered Quad 3 blemishes last season.
Games against Alabama, at Auburn and at Texas A&M are also more than run of the mill Quad 1 opportunities. Each present the Razorbacks with chances against teams inside the top 15 of the NET that could give their resume a bit of gold trim.
Arkansas coach John Calipari booed by Kentucky fans before his Razorbacks silence Rupp Arena in shocking upset
David Cobb
High-end transfers starting to deliver
For much of the 2024-25 season, Kentucky transfer Adou Thiero led the charge for Arkansas’ No. 1-ranked transfer class. The physical wing shined as the rest of a highly touted group floundered.
But over the past two games, Thiero has gotten significant assistance from Johnell Davis and Zvonimir Ivisic as the Razorbacks appear to have discovered a previously missing offensive rhythm.
Davis, who was the No. 1 player in the CBS Sports Transfer Rankings, scored 18 points on 7-of-14 shooting in Saturday’s stunning 89-79 win at Kentucky and followed up with a season-high 24 points on 7-of-15 shooting in the win at Texas.
“Nelly’s done great stuff,” Calipari said. “He’s grown up.”
Ivisic followed up a 14-point performance against Kentucky with nine points, 12 rebounds and four blocks against Texas.
The Razorbacks are still getting little from Jonas Aidoo, a former all-SEC center at Tennessee, but Ivisic’s emergence is giving them a badly needed interior presence who also brings floor spacing. After a recent run of 3-point marksmanship, he’s shooting 41.9% from 3-point range for the season, which is forcing opposing bigs to vacate the paint to defend the 7-foot-2 Croatian.
As a result, Davis and Kentucky transfer DJ Wagner have found driving lanes over the past week which have opened up the entire offense.
Calipari was quick to note after the Texas victory that, “I still think we’ve got a ways to go to reach where we should be.”
However, he scoffed while reflecting on a question that he received prior to the Razorbacks’ recent two-game surge about whether Arkansas had “let go of the rope.”
“They would have let go of the rope already,” he said. “They’re fighting.”
That much is now clear. If Arkansas can keep its grip over the next month, that rope could lead to the NCAA Tournament after all.
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