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Former Arkansas wide receiver Treylon Burks will be in a familiar jersey number in the NFL.
It wasn’t his number in high school, but Burks switched to No. 16 and wore it for three years while playing for the Razorbacks. He’ll continue to wear it with the Tennessee Titans, the team announced Friday.
In an interesting twist, the reason Burks got to keep No. 16 is because another former Arkansas wide receiver — Cody Hollister — changed numbers. Previously wearing 16, Hollister will wear No. 8 moving forward.
A former undrafted free agent who began his career with the Patriots, Hollister has seven receptions for 58 yards during his time at the next level.
Burks, who was taken 18th overall in last month’s NFL Draft, is expected to be much more productive as a replacement for Pro Bowler A.J. Brown.
Although he hasn’t officially signed yet, Burks will likely receive a four-year, $14.3 million contract that includes a $7.6 million bonus and fifth-year option, according to Spotrac.
Notae Receives Invite
After a solid showing in his lone appearance at the Portsmouth Invitational last month, in which he had 16 points, 9 rebounds and 4 assists in 26 minutes, JD Notae has received an invitation to the NBA G League Elite Camp, according to multiple reports.
The former All-American guard could potentially earn an invitation to the NBA Combine if he impresses scouts at the event, which is scheduled for May 16-17 in Chicago.
Arkansas already has one player invited to the combine — which is May 16-22, also in Chicago — in Jaylin Williams. It’ll be the fifth straight year the Razorbacks have been represented at the event.
Softball Wins SEC Outright
The Razorbacks had already clinched a share of the SEC regular-season softball title for a second straight year before the final weekend, but managed to win their first outright title by taking two of three games at Texas A&M.
Interestingly, the championship was actually sealed Friday despite a loss to the Aggies, as Alabama also lost to Missouri that day and was mathematically eliminated.
Arkansas bounced back with two straight wins, though, and completed a “perfect” conference slate by winning its eighth SEC series of 2022.
With a final conference record of 19-5, the Razorbacks finished three games ahead of the Crimson Tide and will be the No. 1 seed in this week’s SEC Tournament in Gainesville, Fla. They’ll face either 8 seed Ole Miss or 9 seed Georgia at 6:30 p.m. CT Thursday on the SEC Network.
It’s an incredible feat considering Arkansas is just six years removed from its second straight 1-23 conference record in Courtney Deifel’s first season. Since then, the Razorbacks have gone 7-17 in 2017, 12-12 in 2018 and 2019, and 19-5 the last two years.
Baseball Gets RPI Boost
Not only was this weekend’s series win at Auburn critical for Arkansas’ baseball team in the SEC West race, but it was also huge from an RPI standpoint.
The Razorbacks were sitting at No. 28 entering the weekend, but jumped up eight spots to No. 20 in the RPI by winning two of three games on the road against a team that was previously No. 4 in the RPI.
HawgBeat touched on why that’s significant last week, but as a reminder, 96.9 percent of all regional hosts over the last 10 years have been top-20 RPI teams. The worst RPI for a team to earn a top-eight national seed over that span was Texas Tech in 2016, which was No. 14.
Arkansas will get another chance to improve its RPI this weekend, as Vanderbilt jumped up seven spots to No. 4 after winning two of three games at Georgia. Alabama, the Razorbacks’ final opponent in the regular season, is No. 55.
Carter Has Surgery
The injury defensive tackle Taurean Carter suffered during Arkansas’ spring showcase back on April 16 has required surgery, according to the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.
The exact nature of the injury and surgery were not known, but a source told HawgBeat that Carter is optimistic he’ll be ready to go for the season. That would seemingly indicate it wasn’t for a torn ACL, confirming what head coach Sam Pittman told reporters in the immediate aftermath of the practice.
Not losing Carter for any part of the 2022 season would be great news for the Razorbacks because he had a highly productive spring ball and plays a thin position.
In fact, Arkansas had only four scholarship defensive tackles for all of spring ball — Carter, Isaiah Nichols, Marcus Miller and Cam Ball — and have so far landed just one, Terry Hampton from Arkansas State, out of the portal.
