Arkansas head coach Sam Pittman will officially begin his fifth season with the Razorbacks on Thursday against Arkansas-Pine Bluff at War Memorial Stadium in Little Rock. The Head Hog held his first Monday press conference of the season in Fayetteville to preview the Golden Lions.
"Looking forward to playing Pine Bluff," Pittman said Monday. "Looking forward to playing an in-state opponent. We know that coach (Alonzo) Hampton has done a good job. As he goes into this year he’ll know more about his team and they’ll have a better team as I hope we do as well. But we have a lot of respect for Pine Bluff, or UAPB, and we’re looking forward to getting over there."
VIDEO: Sam Pittman Monday press conference - UAPB week
Arkansas and UAPB have only faced off one time before — a 45-3 victory for the Razorbacks at War Memorial Stadium on Oct. 23, 2021. That was under a different head coach for the Golden Lions, though, as second-year head coach Alonzo Hampton will look to turn things around from a 2-9 record last season, which was his first with the Golden Lions.
A native of Warren (Ark.), Hampton was previously the special teams coordinator and assistant head coach under Terry Bowden at Louisiana-Monroe. Hampton hired Tony Hull to be his offensive coordinator after Hull spent last year as Grambling's co-offensive coordinator.
Hull also served as passing game coordinator and quarterbacks coach at Grambling last year and helped that group's offense to rank first in the Southwestern Athletic Conference in yards per game (407.8) and rushing yards per game (184.8), plus third in points per game (28.7).
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Leading Hull's offense is expected to be redshirt junior quarterback Mekhi Hagens, a 6-foot-3, 210-pound native of St. Louis. Hagens threw for 580 yards, three touchdowns and four interceptions across nine games played last year. He also ran for 163 yards and four scores on 65 total attempts.
"Quickly on them offensively — we've got to stop the stretch play," Pittman said. "The quarterback is athletic, so he can throw and pass. They don't have a lot of guys coming back. I like their left tackle. They have a center and left tackle. Their left tackle, Christian Love, he's a good player. I like that.
"Schematically, they're going to throw the bubble; they're going to run their quarterback. I expect some RPO-type situations out of them. They've got good team speed, and we've got to, like I say, we've got to stop the bubble screen and we’ve got to stop the stretch. And that's what they did, I thought, very well last year."
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UAPB defensive coordinator David Calloway, who also coaches defensive line, was hired to lead the Golden Lions' defense prior to the 2023 season after serving the previous seven years as the head coach at Central Methodist University. Calloway posted a 28-46-1 overall record at CMU.
"Defensively, they have the same coordinator back," Pittman said. "They base out of a four-man line, a field under G. Not a ton of movement. I expect to see more movement. Not a ton of blitzing, I expect to see more of that. We are taking what we saw from them last year and amping it up.
"We're very rarely running anything against the base front, because we're expecting some type of movement. Zone team, not a lot of man courage out of them. And, but very, very well coached and they play extremely hard."
Last season, Calloway's defense allowed 33.8 points and 444.9 yards of total offense per game to opponents. The Golden Lions had 18 team sacks and four interceptions as a defense a year ago.
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Despite being picked preseason to finish 11th out of 12 teams in the SWAC, the Golden Lions will enter War Memorial Stadium on Thursday not afraid of the SEC team across from them.
"(There) won't be any Golden Lions there that's afraid, there won't be any coaches that (are) afraid," Hampton said Saturday. "We're looking forward to an opportunity to go out there and showcase what our players can do, what our coaches can do and we're going to do it with a smile on our face and it'll be fun."
The Razorbacks and Golden Lions are set for a 6:30 p.m. CT kickoff Thursday at War Memorial Stadium in Little Rock. The game will be televised on ESPNU.
