By Nate Allen
Special to the News-Times
SPRINGDALE - Fittingly, Friday’s annual Kickoff Luncheon at the Springdale Holiday Inn’s Northwest Arkansas Convention Center featuring the Arkansas Razorbacks began with emcee Chuck Barrett’s tribute to Frank Broyles and a moment of silence honoring him.
Broyles, an inductee of both the college football coaches and college athletic director halls of fame for the achievements of coaching the Razorbacks with seven Southwest Conference championships and one national championship in his 1958-76 Arkansas coaching tenure along with fashioning the program into an all-sports powerhouse as athletic director from 1973-2007 that transferred from the SWC to the nationally leading SEC, died last Monday at 92.
A public Celebration of Life memorial service for Broyles is set for 2 p.m. today at Walton Arena.
“Coach Broyles talked so often about the difference makers in the program,” Barrett said. “The truth is, and we all know this, he was the unparalleled difference maker. And there will never be another one like him. We will miss his charm and his passion, but his spirit will live on in every Hog call that we hear from this point on.”
As for the Razorbacks’ present and future, coach Bret Bielema, who opened his first media opportunity Wednesday paying tribute to Broyles, paid tribute to his own team he says has grown after finishing a 7-6 2016 season by losing 24-7 and 24-0 halftime leads in losses at Missouri and in the Belk Bowl to Virginia Tech in Charlotte, N.C.
“When people talk about expecting something from a team that nobody is talking about,” Bielema said, “I’m betting on the Razorbacks. I like where we’re at. I really do. I’m excited. And I think for those reasons, you should be excited, too.”
Bielema explained his optimism.
“We played two games at the end of the year that didn’t go our way that were very upsetting,” Bielema said. “Our guys didn’t run away from it. It’s been in our hearts daily.”
They responded immediately, Bielema, said, in the winter offseason program through spring practice, the summer voluntary workouts and the preseason practices for the initial 105-man roster that began on July 27 and continued through Friday night’s dress rehearsal mock at Reynolds Razorback Stadium in Fayetteville.
The roster expands with Monday’s start of UA fall semester classes marking the final full practice week before the Aug. 31 season-opener against the Florida A&M Rattlers at War Memorial Stadium in Little Rock.
TCU visits Reynolds Razorback Stadium for Arkansas’ Sept.9 first game in Fayetteville, then an open date before opening SEC play Sept. 23 against the Texas A&M Aggies at the neutral site AT&T Stadium owned in Arlington, Texas, by the Dallas Cowboys and Cowboys owner Jerry Jones, the recent NFL Hall of Fame inductee and a Razorbacks guard on Broyles’ 1964 national championship team.
“Spring, offseason and preseason we’ve had a great ride,” Bielema said Friday. “But that ride is done tonight. Now we focus on game week, a Thursday night game against FAMU in Little Rock that will be awesome. And then we jump into playing TCU and we have a bye week before we play A&M, and we traditionally do well against our next opponent after a bye week.”
TCU of the Big 12 and nipped in double overtime last year by Hogs at TCU’s Amon Carter Stadium in Fort Worth, and Texas A&M, 5-0 in SEC West football against Arkansas since joining the SEC in 2012, are old Arkansas rivals from SWC days.
“I can’t wait to play TCU,” Bielema said. “And then we go down to Jerry’s World and play for a man going into the Hall of Fame against a team we haven’t beaten. That’s very much on our mind.”
Arkansas offensive coordinator Dan Enos and defensive coordinator Paul Rhoads addressed Friday’s luncheon, as did Arkansas’ four captains: senior starting quarterback Austin Allen, senior center Frank Ragnow, senior defensive back Kevin Richardson and fourth-year junior defensive back Santos Ramirez.
With the entire coaching staff and likely most of the team attending today’s memorial service, the Razorbacks are using Saturday as their NCAA mandated off day and will practice Sunday, normally their preseason off day.
Once the typical Saturday game-week routine begins, Bielema’s Razorbacks traditionally are off Mondays and do just a light workout on Sundays to get the kinks out from the game with a Tuesday hard practice accelerating preparations.