Musselman still searching for Hogs' best starting lineup, combinations

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FAYETTEVILLE — Over the next month, Eric Musselman will channel his inner chemistry teacher.

With 10 new players in the mix this season and just a week into training camp, Arkansas’ second-year coach is still trying to determine the perfect mix of graduate transfers, sit-out transfers, freshmen and returners before the season begins Nov. 25.

“We change our first unit every single day to try to figure out what combinations work,” Musselman said. “To me, chemistry matters, film matters. There's things the spreadsheet can't tell you, meaning our statistics. Combinations on the floor matter.”

It’s a tall task for the Razorbacks, who have just two returning scholarship players who played last season in juniors Desi Sills and Ethan Henderson.

Sills started 24 games, but ended the year as the team’s sixth man, while Henderson made six starts and saw his role expand later in the season.

Other than them, Arkansas has a trio of graduate transfers, three transfers who sat out last year (including Abayomi Iyiola, who will likely miss the season with a torn ACL) and four true freshmen - all of whom were in the Rivals150.

There is no shortage of options for Musselman, but the next few weeks of practice will also be critical for him to figure out who will fill the shoes of Mason Jones and Isaiah Joe as the Razorbacks’ go-to player.

“Last year at this time I don't think anyone on this call, or certainly anyone in our office, thought that Mason Jones was going to be Co-SEC Player of the Year,” Musselman said. “But we played around with some sets, he put in an incredible amount of work, his confidence rose with each game, and by the time we got to conference play, he was as tough to guard as anyone in the country regardless of league.”

Among the graduate transfers, Justin Smith from Indiana seems like a logical choice coming to the SEC from the Big Ten, but Vance Jackson - a former top-100 recruit who began his career at UConn before transferring to New Mexico - and Jalen Tate - a the 2020 Defensive Player of the Year in the Horizon League - are also seemingly capable.

As transfers from Jacksonville and Cal, respectively, who had to sit out last season, JD Notae is expected to be a scoring threat for the Razorbacks and Connor Vanover is a 7-foot-3 three-point shooter.

Perhaps the player most fans are excited about, though, is freshman Moses Moody. An elite shooter, he was the No. 56 overall recruit in the Class of 2020 and has a chance to be the first one-and-done in UA history. However, fellow signees KK Robinson, Jaylin Williams and Davonte Davis were also four-star prospects.

“I feel like we have guys that can do different things,” Moody said. “I feel like I can fill in some of (Jones and Joe’s) shoes with the threes and taking over games in late-game situations, but we also have guys like Justin who’s going to take over in another way, different from Mason or Isaiah but it’s still going to have the same effect. We’ve got guys like JD, Vance, KK, (Tate), different players in different roles that can make a huge change in a game.”

Finding the go-to guy fills just one of five spots in the starting lineup, though. Musselman is using training camp to get a look at multiple combinations.

It’s unclear if he’ll eventually settle on one primary lineup or switch it up from game to game, as he’s done both throughout his career.

As the head coach of the Golden State Warriors in 2002-03, Musselman used the same starting five the first 66 games of the season before Troy Murphy got hurt and I need up missing three games. The other four guys started all 82 games. At Nevada,his lineups stayed relatively consistent.

In the D-League, switching up the starting lineup was much more common. Arkansas got a taste of that last season, with only one player starting all 32 games and eight players making at least five starts. Musselman said he’s still searching for the best plan for this year’s team.

“I’m willing to do whatever’s best for the team,” Musselman said. “I think the important thing for our players to understand is every decision we make is what’s in the best interest of Arkansas. If that means changing the starting lineup, if that means having the same four starters and maybe one guy alternates, if it means the same three starters, I don’t really know.”

Looking at the roster, it seems like the Razorbacks have the versatility and depth to go with the latter strategy - change the starting lineup and rotations based on matchups. The key will be all the various pieces meshing despite not having a lot of time together.

“I haven’t been with a group like this in college,” Jackson said. “Everybody’s talented and we’ve all been playing since July, so our chemistry, I feel like it’s got a good flow and it’s only getting better because it’s still early.”

In a normal year, Musselman would get to see his team face some outside competition in scrimmages or exhibition games.

Last season, Arkansas hosted UALR for an exhibition and it proved to be a valuable experience for the Razorbacks. In addition to getting a first look at his team, Musselman said he was able to talk to the Trojans’ head coach - Darrell Walker - afterward and exchange ideas about each other’s squad.

That won’t happen this year, though, as the SEC has eliminated those games because of the coronavirus pandemic. Instead, Arkansas will have to get creative to replicate those experiences for the players.

“Not having closed-door scrimmages or exhibitions, it’s tough, so we’re going to do a COVID Cup,” Musselman said. “Basically have little mini games certain days of the week and chart it and that’s going to be our closed-door scrimmages, our internal COVID Cup.”

Even before the so-called “COVID Cup,” Arkansas is getting a lot of live work in practice. In fact, Musselman said the Razorbacks are scrimmaging about twice as much as they did last season.

“With so many new guys, I don't really know what it's going to look like right now,” Musselman said. “We're going to start doing some full scrimmages. I mean, we've taken stats in practice more than we ever have.

“We've gone live more than we ever have because we are trying to figure out, not who the best drill guy is, but who the best guy in live play is.”