CAMDEN — FAYETTEVILLE - The University of Arkansas’ Monday beginning of fall semester classes signals the end of the Razorbacks’ Monday football practices until their season-ending game week wrapping with the Nov. 25 day after Thanksgiving SEC game at Missouri.
Otherwise Arkansas Coach Bret Bielema uses Monday as the Razorbacks’ mandatory one off day per week and has his players try and schedule classes accordingly.
In this final week without a game prior to the Sept. 3 season-opener against Louisiana Tech at Reynolds Razorback Stadium, Bielema definitely will practice the Razorbacks Tuesday through Thursday and launch game week with a Sunday practice.
After Louisiana Tech, coached by Skip Holtz, whose father, former Arkansas Coach Lou Holtz, will be among eight inducted into the UA’s Sports Hall of Honor at Sep. 2 dinner ceremony at the John Q. Hammons Center in Rogers, the Razorbacks visit the TCU Horned Frogs, Sept. 10 at TCU’s Amon Carter Stadium in Fort Worth.
Ranked 13th in Monday’s AP poll, the Horned Frogs of the Big 12 are among five AP ranked teams on Arkansas’ schedule including SEC West rivals, Alabama, LSU, and Ole Miss, respectively ranked No. 1, No. 5 and No. 11, plus 25th-ranked Florida of the SEC East.
All but TCU of those ranked teams play Arkansas in Fayetteville.
Bielema, whose eventual 8-5 Liberty Bowl champion Razorbacks of 2015 began that season 1-2 nonconference consecutively stubbing their toes against Toledo in Little Rock and Texas Tech in Fayetteville, insists his Razorbacks won’t be caught looking past the Louisiana Tech Bulldogs, 9-4, last season.
“Everybody wants to jump to TCU, everybody wants to jump to Ole Miss and Alabama and LSU and Florida, the games here,”Bielema told last Friday’s Razorback Kickoff Luncheon at the Springdale Holiday Inn’s Northwest Arkansas Convention Center. “But we're concentrating on La Tech. Skip Holtz is a tremendous football coach I've known for a long time. They're going to come in here ready to rock and roll. They have a lot of very, very good players returning. They did lose some to the draft at key positions, but they'll come in here with a full head of steam. We got to TCU after that. It's going to be a tremendous challenge our kids will embrace.”
Though receiving votes, Arkansas did not get ranked in the first AP Top 25 poll released Monday. Nor were the Razorbacks included in the Coaches Top 25 released Aug. 4 that also ranked reigning national champion Alabama No. 1 while ranking LSU, sixth; Ole Miss, 12th; TCU, 14th; and Florida 25th.
Par for the course, Bielema told last Friday’s luncheon pre-AP poll but with the Coaches poll out as well as the national football magazine’s preseason editions.
“It’s angry for me,” Bielema said. “I showed our players something that came out in the spring last year that had the percentage of people winning the SEC West, I think 2 percent thought that the Arkansas Razorbacks could do that. As a little motivational tool we kind of had a little saying all spring, 'Two percent, two percent.”
I've said along in my career, and I believe it with all my heart, it's not the polls at the beginning of the season, but the ones at the end that matter.”
Senior defensive end Deatrich Wise, excused from last Saturday’s scrimmage to attend his grandfather’s funeral, should resume practice Tuesday.
Bielema said that senior receiver Dominique Reed of Camden Fairview idled by a sprained ankle, and senior cornerback D.J. Dean, pulled hamstring, are among the injured that might be ready to resume practice this week.
Bielema addressed Monday’s meeting of the Little Rock Touchdown Club and on