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FAYETTEVILLE — It has been more than a decade since Arkansas visited Sanford Stadium, but Sam Pittman is very familiar with Georgia’s football program.
The Razorbacks’ second-year coach was the Bulldogs’ offensive line coach from 2016-19, helping them evolve into a recruiting juggernaut and win three straight SEC East titles.
Even though he is living his dream as the head coach at Arkansas, Pittman has always spoken highly of his former employer and head coach Kirby Smart.
“The people in Georgia were so kind to Jamie and I,” Pittman said. “We were there for four years. Kirby, I obviously had a lot of good memories about him and the way he treated me and the staff.”
A branch off the Nick Saban coaching tree, Smart hired Pittman away from Arkansas when he was hired at Georgia following the 2015 season.
From practice organization to demanding assistants to be the best they can be, which includes on the recruiting trail, Pittman said he learned a lot from Smart during those four seasons.
“He’s at his alma mater and he wants to win for the state of Georgia, the University of Georgia - you’ve got to respect all that,” Pittman said. “His kids, they play extremely hard. You don’t find many teams that are playing extremely hard that don’t have high respect for the head coach.”
On the flip side, Pittman is still widely respected and loved by the Bulldogs’ fan base, and his boss hasn’t been surprise by how quickly he’s turned the Arkansas program around.
“They’ve done a tremendous job creating a new culture and energy there at Arkansas,” Smart said. “We wouldn’t expect anything less from him. Very thankful for what he did with our organization before he left.”
Here are several other notes and tidbits ahead of Saturday’s top-10 showdown in Athens…
Chess Match
Earlier this week, Pittman compared the various fronts defensive coordinator Barry Odom presents to opposing offenses to the different third-down blitzes Georgia defensive coordinator Dan Lanning brings each week.
It’s hard to prepare for so many looks in just one week, but it helps that Pittman faced Lanning every day in practice during the 2019 season…or does it? That familiarity works both ways, Pittman said.
Lanning could potentially give the Razorbacks a different look than what Pittman is used to seeing, or he might just stick with what he does normally and say, ‘Try to block us.’
“That’s the beauty of college coaching or any coaching,” Pittman said. “Trying to out-wit the other guy and just make sure you don’t screw your own team up by giving each other too much credit.”
Road Environment
After a year of reduced crowds because of the pandemic, Arkansas will play in a hostile environment Saturday afternoon for the first time since Nov. 23, 2019, when it took on No. 1 LSU at a packed Tigers Stadium.
Sanford Stadium, which has a listed capacity of 92,746, is expected to be rocking with College GameDay in town.
