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Arkansas is out of the running for the regular-season SEC title, but it has nearly clinched second place in the league.
Although the Razorbacks took care of business against LSU on Saturday, Alabama hung on for a narrow victory at Mississippi State to capture its first SEC crown since 2002. The Crimson Tide would have needed to lose their last three games for Arkansas to have a chance to overtake them.
With a 1.5-game lead and only two games remaining, though, the Razorbacks are knocking on the door of a No. 2 seed in the SEC Tournament, something they haven’t done since 2015.
At this point, the only team that could possibly catch Arkansas in the standings is Florida, which beat Kentucky on Saturday to improve to 9-5 in conference play.
For the Gators to surpass the Razorbacks in the standings, they not only have to beat Missouri on Wednesday and Tennessee on the road next Sunday, but Arkansas would also have to lose at South Carolina on Tuesday and against Texas A&M on Saturday.
In that scenario, Florida would be 11-5 and Arkansas would be 11-6, half of a game behind. However, that seems unlikely. Using the latest Basketball Power Index odds on ESPN, that has just a 0.4 percent chance of happening.
Even if it does, the Razorbacks would fall no further than to the No. 3 seed, so they have already clinched a double-bye that comes with being a top-four seed in Nashville.
Tennessee’s loss to Auburn on Saturday ensured that it can no longer surpass them in the standings and the best LSU can do is tie them at 11-6. In the event of a tie with the Tigers, Arkansas would get the higher seed because the teams split their regular-season matchups and Arkansas owns a win over Alabama, the No. 1 seed.
No matter what happens next week - whether they end up with the No. 2 or No. 3 seed - the Razorbacks will far exceed the sixth-place finish predicted by the media before the season.
