Petrino source of confidence at Arkansas

By STEPHEN CALDWELL

For the AJC

Fayetteville, Ark. — The Little Rock Touchdown Club ran ads on the radio and in the statewide paper the weekend before University of Arkansas football coach Bobby Petrino spoke at their luncheon earlier this season -– not to solicit ticket sales but to discourage them.

“We were sold out,” said Rex Nelson, the club’s vice president and one of its co-founders. “We were trying to discourage walk-ups.”

The luncheons, which normally draw no more than 400 fans, topped 700 to hear Petrino on the Monday before the Razorbacks’ season-opening 48-10 victory against Missouri State.

Yes, Petrino is riding high in Razorback Land, packing the house at speaking events all across the state during the offseason. Forget the storm of national media criticism that greeted him after he ran out on the Atlanta Falcons with a 3-10 record and three games left in the 2007 season. Never mind that he needs a victory here Saturday against 23rd-ranked Georgia just to get to .500 as the Hogs’ coach. Or that few experts predict Arkansas will finish higher than fourth in the SEC West this year.

“You’d have to talk to a lot of people to find someone in Arkansas who’s not sold on Bobby Petrino and what he can do for this program,” said Jimmy Dykes, a UA grad who lives in Fayetteville and works as an ESPN basketball analyst. “The most important thing he has done is reunite the fan base.”

Petrino replaced Houston Nutt, who managed 75 victories, eight bowl bids, three SEC West titles and four nine-win seasons in his 10 years at Arkansas. But after an 8-4 record in 2007 that got Arkansas into the Cotton Bowl, the university paid Nutt $3.2 million just to leave town.

Some fans were unhappy with what they saw as his inability to develop a passing game or his 2-5 record in bowl games or an average of 4.8 losses a season. Mostly, though, they were tired of the drama that arose primarily around Nutt’s dealings with star quarterback Mitch Mustain (who transferred to USC after the 2006 season) and offensive coordinator Gus Malzahn (who now is at Auburn).

So Nutt went to Ole Miss, where he’s led the Rebels into the top 10 in his second year on the job, and Arkansas fans have rallied around Petrino.

“The Houston Nutt decade was such a roller coaster that people were looking for fewer curves and more calm and that’s what coach Petrino delivers,” Nelson said. “His personality is very different than Coach Nutt. To the average fan, that was a welcomed change to the soap opera they’d just lived through.”

Petrino lacks the charismatic style of his predecessor but fans say he inspires confidence with his attention to detail, his focus on discipline, his straight-forward approach, his ability to recruit top players nationally and, most of all, his history for winning with a high-octane offense.

“I haven’t seen this much excitement about Arkansas football in years,” said Ben Hubbard, president of the Razorback Club in the northeast Arkansas town of Blytheville. “People in Arkansas love their football and know their football, so they get excited when they think a coach is going to provide entertaining football. And they think it will work.”

It worked at Louisville, where Petrino was 41-9 and where his teams ranked in the top five nationally in scoring offense and in the top 10 in total offense all four years he was head coach. But his first Arkansas team was slow out of the gate in 2008, beating Western Illinois and Louisiana-Monroe by a combined five points before getting slammed in consecutive games by Alabama (49-14), Texas (52-10) and Florida (38-7).

The Hogs showed improvement as the season went on, however, especially on offense. Quarterback Casey Dick ended the season with 2,586 passing yards and Michael Smith rushed for 1,072. They finished 5-7 and ended with a 31-30 victory over LSU.

“That win against LSU was huge,” said Harold Horton, executive director of the Razorback Foundation, the fund-raising arm for UA’s athletics department. “That left a good taste in everybody’s mouth. It gave the state a lot to be proud about. That’s carried over and gained momentum.”

Arkansas’ 2009 schedule includes games at Alabama, Florida and Ole Miss, all teams ranked in the top 10. But the players and many fans are optimistic that the Razorbacks can win six, seven, or possibly even eight games this year, and even more in the years ahead.

“The electricity is flowing,” Horton said. “The anticipation is there of good things to come.”

And what about Petrino’s reputation for exploring greener pastures? Arkansas fans seem unconcerned.

“If he left Arkansas, it would be for one of two reason,” said Dykes. “He didn’t get the job done and got fired, which isn’t going to happen. Or he gets it done and goes on to a better program. But I think that’s a short list. If he wins enough to get that kind of offer, it’s a win-win for Arkansas. He will have left Arkansas in a much better situation than he found it.”