By Nate Allen
Special to the News-Times
FAYETTEVILLE - For the first time since the 2012 Razorbacks entered nationally No. 10 then crashed 4-8 under Coach John L. Smith, Arkansas starts a football season ranked in the Amway Coaches Poll.
Third-year Coach Bret Bielema’s Razorbacks, off winning three of their last four games last year for a 7-6 season after a 3-9 record in 2013, are ranked No. 20.
Reigning national champion Ohio State tops the Amway Coaches poll followed by TCU.
Alabama, the reigning SEC champion, is third and one of eight SEC teams in the Amway top 25 including Auburn, seventh; Georgia, ninth; LSU, 13th; Ole Miss, 15th; Arkansas, 20th; Missouri, 23rd; and Tennessee, 25th.
The rest in the Amway top ten include Baylor, Oregon and Michigan State, fourth through sixth; Florida State, eighth; and Southern California, 10th.
Notre Dame and Clemson ranked 11th and 12th; UCLA, 14th, Arizona State, Georgia Tech, Wisconsin and Oklahoma, 16th through 19th; Stanford, 21st; Arizona, 22nd; and Boise State, 24th.
After SEC’s eight, the Pac-12 is next with six teams, headed by No. 5 Oregon.
The Big Ten, led by Ohio State, and ACC, led by No. 8 Florida State, each have three and the Big 12 has three led by No. 2 TCU.
Boise State of the Mountain West and Notre Dame, a football independent, are the only schools in the Amway poll not football affiliated with one of the power five conferences.
GOLFER PLEAS
University of Arkansas golfer Taylor Moore pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of voyeurism Wednesday and was sentenced in Washington County Circuit Court to one year’s probation and to pay a $1,000 fine.
Moore and Razorbacks golfing teammate Nicolas Echavarria were arrested in May on suspicion of video voyeurism, a felony.
Charges against Echavarria were dropped in June.
Moore pleaded guilty to a lesser charge and is ordered to have no contact with the victim.
A woman who said she was a friend of both golfers, encountered the two while bar-hopping with a friend on Dickson Street.
She told Fayetteville police she believed she was too intoxicated to drive home and accepted a ride to Moore’s house.
She said she passed out on their couch and was carried to a bedroom but said she awoke to flashes of light and suspected that she was being photographed.
Upon their arrests, Moore, the Razorbacks’ top golfer and Echavarria, last year’s No. 4 Arkansas men’s golfer, immediately were suspended from the Razorbacks’ golf team just before NCAA Regionals. Neither went to the Yale Regional where Arkansas was eliminated.
Arkansas Coach Brad McMakin has not commented on Moore and Echavarria since the UA announced their suspensions before the Yale Regional.
Moore and Echavarria both are seniors-to-be for the 2015-2016 fall and spring men’s golf seasons.
SCIENTIFIC ROCKETS
Former Arkansas Coach Danny Ford, on the College of Fame ballot for his coaching days at Clemson that included a national championship, amused Arkansas with his malaprop regarding a situation that “didn’t take no scientific rocket to figure that out.”
Well, it seems when Arkansas visits the Tennessee Vols Oct. 3 in Knoxville that a couple of scientific rockets will take up space.
Tennessee quarterback Joshua Dobbs majors in aerospace engineering.
Jemal Singleton, Arkansas’ running backs coach hired away last spring from Oklahoma State, is an Air Force Academy grad and Air Force veteran.
“During the interview process we are going through our offensive schemes and philosophies and he’s on the board showing me things,” Bielema said.
“He said one of the things that makes me laugh is when you talk football how coaches say, ‘It’s not that hard. It’s not rocket science.’ He said, ‘I took rocket science in the Air Force for two years. I know what rocket science is.’”
Apparently the Air Force football program recognized that Singleton also knows leadership.
“He is one of five players in the history of the Air Force Academy that was a two-time (football) captain,” Bielema said. “He was a captain as a senior and a junior.”
REVIEWING AND LOOKING AHEAD
Third-year Arkansas coach Bielema reviews his second Razorbacks season both smiling and frowning.
Going 7-6 overall and 2-6 in the SEC in 2014 sure beats going 3-9 and 0-8 in 2013 but other than one year pales to what Bielema accomplished going 68-23 head coaching Wisconsin from 2006-2012.
“The No. 1 thing when I look back on a year ago is we were better than Year One,” Bielema said.
Many took notice. Some even pick Arkansas to win the SEC West.
“A lot of people are saying nice things about us which is really good,” Bielema said.
“But I think it’s very embarrassing because we really haven’t accomplished much in my opinion. We won seven games and that equals the worst record I ever had at my previous institution.
“By no means is that a landing point but a launching point. I think this group is a very hungry group that is not satisfied with seven wins.”
They could again be significantly better and still be 7-6 or barely above it.
Arkansas’ SEC West schedule is a murderer’s row of Texas A&M, Alabama, Auburn, Ole Miss, LSU and Mississippi State plus SEC East opponents Tennessee and Missouri, the reigning SEC East champion.
“We have a very challenging schedule in the SEC West,” Bielema said. “The greatest thing about our schedule is we are the only ones that get to play it. That’s the way we sell it to our kids. We don’t worry about anybody else but our own.”