A Golden Night of Hoops in the Natural State -- Did You Notice?

March 16 was a good night for basketball in the state of Arkansas.

Come to think of it, the last two weeks have been really good for basketball in the state of Arkansas and – get this – none of it involved the Arkansas Razorbacks, men or women.



Yes, believe it or not, good things can happen in sports in this state other than the Razorbacks.

Tuesday night, the UAPB Golden Lions won the opening round game of the NCAA Tournament in Dayton, Ohio, earning the right to be the 16-seed and face top-seed Duke Friday in Jacksonville, Florida. In Russellville, Arkansas, the Golden Suns of Arkansas Tech won the NCAA Division II South Regional final over the Delta State Lady Statesmen. Tech will head to the Division II Women’s Elite Eight next week in St. Joseph, Missouri.

Monday night, the UALR women’s program earned an at-large berth in the NCAA Women’s Tournament. The Lady Trojans were honored for their 21-game winning streak and the committee surely had to recognize that both Middle Tennessee State and UALR were two of the top 64 teams in the nation.

When you add the success in Hot Springs with the Sun Belt Conference and Arkansas High School state championship games, that’s a lot of good basketball in our fair state.

But, for the most part, just a handful of people noticed. This time it isn’t the statewide media’s fault. Stories about UAPB’s men, Arkansas Tech’s women and UALR’s women were covered by every television station, in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette and on sports radio shows across the state.

I might contend that it’s the narrow scope of fans who think anything but big-time Division I athletics isn’t worth following.

There were a handful of pot-shots taken at UAPB because they were in the “play-in” game as winners of the SWAC, but how is that their fault? They are members of the SWAC, they won the SWAC tournament and they earned a spot in the tournament.

I saw a lot of comments on facebook and twitter to the effect of “UAPB can make the tournament and Arkansas can’t. Fire Pelphrey.” Now what kind of logic is that? Did they say anything last year when the SWAC winner made it, but the Razorbacks didn’t?
Sorry, I digress.

I understand that big-time Division I athletics is the most attended and the programs garner the most attention. But who says that fans have to follow big-time programs exclusively. In Arkansas there are “mid-majors”, Division II, Division III and NAIA universities in many communities around the state.

It is possible to follow the Razorbacks and another team, especially if there is a college in your town or close to it. I challenge you to pick one. It’s fairly safe to say that you’ll never have to choose between that team and the Razorbacks considering the “no playing in-state schools” policy.

As an alum and follower of a Division II school, I think it would be fair to say that the Division II schools don’t consider themselves on the same level as most of the Razorback athletic teams. (Although there are a couple of sports in which a good challenge might have been put up in recent years). Nobody is saying that the winner of the SWAC or Gulf South is as good as the winner of the SEC.

But they’re still good and competition is competition. If more local people gave it a chance and went to the games, the atmosphere would be even better.

And if those fans had been in Russellville on Tuesday night, in Arkadelphia for a hotly-contested Ouachita vs. Henderson game or in the Jack Stephens Center for an ASU-UALR tilt, I can almost guarantee that they’d come back for more.

And you know, I bet the Razorbacks would still garner most of the attention, and rightly so. And they’d still have thousands of people at their games – well, unless they’re not winning, and the fair-weathered nature of Natural State fans is an entirely different topic.