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FAYETTEVILLE — When Eric Musselman set out to fill his first coaching staff at Arkansas, he looked for assistants who checked one or two boxes.

Considering he’s been coaching in college for just seven years, with only the last four being as a head coach and not at the high-major level, the first thing he wanted was to add an assistant with Division I head coaching experience.

Corey Williams checks that box, as he came to Arkansas after a six-year stint as the head coach at Stetson. As a bonus, he also played in the NBA, winning a title with Michael Jordan and the Chicago Bulls in 1993.

“I wanted a former NBA player on staff,” Musselman said. “I felt that was important from a recruiting standpoint and it was important for our guys that want to play at the next level.”

That professional experience was also a key motivator in hiring Clay Moser, who - like Musselman - worked his way through the CBA, D-League and NBA. Most recently, he worked with the Los Angeles Lakers.

Several times throughout his career, Moser and Musselman teamed up, which means he knew his system and terminology - another one of the boxes he wanted to check when hiring assistants.

“Clay Moser and I have worked together at six or seven different spots, so he’s overly familiar with in-game situations and how I would react to what we want to do on wrinkles and plays late game and so forth,” Musselman said. “Clay having 17 years of NBA experience is really big in recruiting, to have somebody that was on a staff coaching LeBron James last year.”

Musselman said it was also “overly vital” to find an assistant who had coached and recruited this region of the country at the Power Five level. He checked that box by hiring Chris Crutchfield away from Oklahoma as his associate head coach.

“We feel extremely excited about who we have as a staff,” Musselman said. “I think they’re a really good complement because they all have completely different backgrounds.”

Scheduling Philosophy

Earlier this week, Arkansas finally announced its full 2019-20 schedule. It includes 18 games inside Bud Walton Arena and what Musselman calls a “challenging” non-conference slate highlighted by three true road games.