The Dallas Morning News is reporting that the Texas Longhorns and Arkansas Razorbacks have an agreement for a home-and-home series beginning in 2008. No one has signed on the dotted line yet, but the two SWC rivals would meet in Austin in 2008 and in Fayettenam Fayetteville in 2009.
The two teams are also exploring the possibility of bringing the series to Dallas after the first two years if the Red River Rivalry between Texas and Oklahoma is turned into a home-and-home. According to Kirk Bohls, that is an increasingly likely situation. The new Texas-[tag]Arkansas[/tag] series would likely take place in the new Cowboys stadium in Arlington.
I’m personally I’m not a huge fan of this decision. I love that we’re scheduling bigger name opponents from a power conference instead of more Sam Houston States, but there’s very little to gain from playing the Piggies. With the current state of their program, there’s absolutely nothing to gain from playing them. It’s a huge rivalry game that if we win it was a game we were supposed to win and if we lose it’s big news. All this does is help them recruit Texas better, especially if the game is played in Dallas every year.
I’d rather schedule opponents like Cal out of the Pac 10, Penn State or Wisconsin out of the Big 10, or Boston College out of the ACC. All those games would bring big national exposure, would be exciting to watch, and expose the program to new recruiting areas. They’re also teams that would usually be tougher opponents and bring more prestige than a win over a team like Arkansas. They’re also teams that I usually think are vastly overrated by the national media.
The Texas-Arkansas matchup should be an interesting game in 2008, we’ll see what kind of team Houston Nutt and Mitch Mustain bring to Austin and if the Horns can bring the kind of fire and hatred the Razorbacks had the last two times the teams met.
reply to #1
Robert
May 1st, 2006 at 10:52 pm
I am old enough to remember the “Game of the Century” in 1969. What a great game! It also reminds me that Penn State was undefeated that year and the great argument that followed over whether Texas or the Nittany Lions were the best team that year. Texas beat Notre Dame in the Cotton Bowl (remember when the Cotton Bowl was a very big bowl game?) and this was the first time in ages that the the Irish were allowed to go to a bowl game by the ND administration. The Longhorns beat ND 21-17 in a great game and Penn State beat Missouri 10-3 in the Orange Bowl.
The following year, Texas may have had an even better team, but lost to ND in the Cotton Bowl, 24-11. The next year found the Longhorns in the Cotton Bowl again, facing what would have been a great 1969 matchup against Penn St., with Penn St. winning 30-6.
This game makes me nostalgic for the old for the “old” Southwest Conference with Arkansas and all of the Texas teams. That was a good time! It probably was every bit as good as the current Big XII, top to bottom.
Anyway, 1969 was a great year, capped by a great game against Notre Dame!