FAYETTEVILLE — After leading Arkansas to its best record in 20 years, Coach Mike Anderson is facing one of the biggest challenges of his career.
The Razorbacks bear little resemblance to the team that finished 27-9 last season and made Arkansas’ first NCAA Tournament since 2008
This season figured to be tough enough when SEC Player of the Year Bobby Portis and guard Michael Qualls
— the SEC’s top scoring tandem last season — decided to leave early for the NBA and joined seniors Ky Madden and Alandise Harris as lost starters.
Then came July 22, when the Razorbacks’ lone returning starter, sophomore guard Anton Beard, was arrested along with senior forward Jacorey Williams and junior forward Dustin Thomas in connection with a counterfeit investigation.
That same day, news broke that freshman forward Ted Kapita, a highly regarded signee expected to play immediately and bolster Arkansas’ thin front line, would be academically ineligible this season.
Beard, Thomas and Williams eventually were charged with first-degree felony forgery. They all pleaded innocent and have court dates in December.
Anderson dismissed Williams, a probable starter, from the team while Beard and Thomas remain suspended indefinitely from the team but are enrolled in school.
Thomas, a transfer from Colorado, must redshirt this season in accordance with NCAA rules, but Beard figured to be a team leader.
The losses of Beard, Kapita and Williams have reduced Arkansas to 10 scholarship players going into Anderson’s fifth season with the Razorbacks.
Preseason media polls project Arkansas to finish between 10th and 13th in the SEC a year after the Razorbacks finished 13-5 and second behind Kentucky.
Anderson said the summer events “blindsided” him, but 12 seasons as a head coach at Alabama-Birmingham, Missouri and Arkansas along with 17 seasons as a Razorbacks assistant have equipped him to handle whatever happens.
“I’ve seen the good, I’ve seen the bad,” Anderson said. “I’ve seen it all.”
Anderson’s first Arkansas team opened the 2011-2012 season with 10 scholarship players — three players transferred after he took the job — and then the Razorbacks lost leading scorer and rebounder Marshawn Powell to a season-ending knee injury in the second game.
At times during the season Arkansas played with eight healthy scholarship players, but the Razorbacks finished 18-14.
During Anderson’s second season at Missouri in 2007-2008, he suspended five players after they were involved in an altercation outside of a nightclub.
The suspensions left the Tigers with six scholarship players for a game against Nebraska that Missouri lost 66-62.
Missouri had eight scholarship players for its next game against No. 22 Kansas State and upset the Wildcats and then-coach Frank Martin 77-74.
Martin is now going into this third season as South Carolina’s coach.
“Arkansas’ program is going to be fine because it’s in the right hands with Mike,” Martin said at SEC media day when asked about the Razorbacks’ roster issues. “Arkansas is still going to win games. Mike’s got that established already. He’s going to have Arkansas rolling.”
Missouri finished the 2007-2008 season with 10 scholarship players and a 16-16 record.
Anderson never has suffered a losing record as a head coach while taking UAB, Missouri and Arkansas to a combined seven NCAA Tournament and two NIT appearances, facing a rebuilding task at each stop.
“We’ve been faced with some adversity everywhere we’ve been,” said Arkansas assistant coach T.J. Cleveland, a former Razorbacks point guard and team captain who is going into his 13th season on Anderson’s staff. “It’s nothing new to us. You’ve just got to find a way to get through it, and it starts with the leadership Coach Anderson provides.
“No matter the situation, he never panics. He never rushes to a quick decision. There’s always a thought process in everything he does.
“He’s always going to look out for the kids’ best interests along with the best interests of the program.”
Arkansas senior guard Anthlon Bell, the team’s leading returning scorer who averaged 7.9 points last season, said Anderson remained calm during last summer’s turmoil.
“Coach A has handled it well, keeping us all in line and telling us we’re going to handle what we can handle,” Bell said. “We know how well he works under adversity. He always steps up to the plate when there’s pressure on him.
“We don’t expect anything less from him this time around.”
Arkansas’ six returning eligible players averaged a combined 13.5 points in SEC play last season — less than Portis or Qualls. Portis, a first-round pick by the Chicago Bulls, averaged 18.6 points. Qualls, a free agent signee with Oklahoma City after suffering a knee injury in a pre-draft workout, averaged 15.2.
“There are a lot of questions about this team that we’re trying to answer,” Anderson said. “We’ve got to get some guys that have been in different roles to be mainstream guys.
“I think that’s going to be the key: How soon can they make that transformation? Is it going to be through preseason practice? Is it going to be through the nonconference schedule?
“It better be before the conference schedule.”
Anderson is counting on returning players such as Bell, junior center Moses Kingsley, junior guard Manny Watkins, senior forward Keaton Miles, senior guard Jabril Durham and sophomore forward Trey Thompson to make big gains and for freshman guard Jimmy Whitt and junior guard Dusty Hannahs — a transfer from Texas Tech who redshirted last season — to have a sudden impact.
“This group of guys is hungry,” Anderson said. “They’ve waited for an opportunity to be the front guys. Now lets see if they can do it.”
Anderson sustained success previously at UAB and Missouri.
When Anderson coached at UAB, the Blazers went to the NIT his first season, then to the NCAA Tournament the next three years before he left to take over at Missouri. The Tigers went to the NCAA Tournament Elite Eight his third season, then returned to the NCAA Tournament the next two seasons before he took the Arkansas job.
Anderson’s Elite Eight team that went 31-7 during the 2008-2009 season lost its top three scorers in DaMarre Carroll (16.6 points), Leo Lyons (14.6) and Matt Lawrence (9.2).
Missouri went 23-11 the next season, including 1-1 in the NCAA Tournament with a victory over Clemson and a loss to West Virginia, with sophomore guard Kim English improving his scoring average from the previous season from 6.5 to 14.6, sophomore guard Marcus Denmon from 6.0 to 10.4, sophomore forward Laurence Bowers from 3.7 to 10.2, junior forward Justin Stafford from 3.4 to 8.6 and with freshman guard Michael Dixon averaging 8.1 points.
“After we lost so much from our Elite Eight team people were going, ‘Where is the scoring going to come from? Where is the defense going to come from?’ ” Anderson said. “Then we ended up going back to the NCAA Tournament the next season and winning 23 games.”
Anderson said this season’s Razorbacks can enjoy similar success if they’ll pull together.
“I think we’ll open up the floor quite a bit,” he said. “You’re probably going to see a team that shoots a lot more three-pointers, a lot of penetration and pitch. But we’re not going to go away from what’s in our DNA, and that’s on the defensive end. We’ve got to be a tough, tenacious, hard-nosed defensive team.”
Ole Miss Coach Andy Kennedy said Arkansas could be a surprise and surpass its preseason expectations.
“I know Mike knows what he’s doing,” Kennedy said at SEC media days. “I know Mike is going to have a group that’s going to be very competitive.
“I know they’re going to play extremely hard, and their style of play is such that they’re not really dependent on one guy making shots, because they’re going to try to create a tempo that’s going to allow them to be successful.”
Pat Bradley, a radio talk show host in Little Rock, was a freshman guard on the Razorbacks team that unexpectedly reached the NCAA Tournament Sweet 16 after losing junior college transfers Sunday Adebayo, Jesse Pate and Marcus Saxon to eligibility issues.
Saxon never played the for the Razorbacks while Adebayo and Pate were declared ineligible during the season. The NCAA later admitted it erred in Adebayo’s case, and he was allowed to play for Arkansas his senior season in 1997-1998 after playing the previous season at Memphis.
“With Coach Anderson, what I feel good about is he’s been in situations like this before whether as an assistant coach or as a head coach,” Bradley said. “If there’s anybody that understands what needs to be done when you’re going through a rough patch, he knows how to do it.
“He’s rallied the troops before. Sometimes you get more out of guys when their backs are against the wall. I think guys realize, ‘If I don’t do it, if I don’t take care of business, it’s not going to happen.’ “
Anderson said the Razorbacks need to be tough mentally as well as physically and play together.
“When you go through life, a lot of things come at you,” Anderson said. “Now, how do you react? Do you panic? Or do you meet it head on?
“That will be the challenge for our team, how we respond to adversity now that we’ve hit a little bump in the road.
“I think if every guy does what he’s supposed to do, it’ll come together pretty nicely.”
Arkansas schedule
DATE OPP. TIME/TV
Nov. 10 Delta State^ 7 p.m. Nov. 13 Southern 7 p.m. Nov. 18 Akron& 7 p.m.
Nov. 20 Charleston Southern& 7 p.m.
Nov. 26 Georgia Tech&@ 1 p.m./ESPNU
Nov. 27 Villanova/Stanford&@ 11:30 a.m./2:30 p.m./ESPN2/ESPNU
Dec. 1 Northwestern (La.) St. 7 p.m.
Dec. 4 at Wake Forest 6 p.m.
Dec. 8 Evansville 8 p.m./SECN
Dec. 12 Tennessee Tech 7 p.m./SECN
Dec. 19 Mercer! 7 p.m.
Dec. 22 North Florida 7 p.m.
Dec. 30 at Dayton 7 p.m./CBSSN
Jan. 2 at Texas A&M* 3:30 p.m./SECN
Jan. 5 Vanderbilt* 8 p.m./SECN
Jan. 9 Mississippi State* 2:30 p.m./SECN
Jan. 12 at Missouri* 8 p.m./SECN
Jan. 16 at LSU* 7:30 p.m./SECN
Jan. 21 Kentucky* 6 p.m./ESPN/ESPN2
Jan. 23 at Georgia* 5 p.m./SECN
Jan. 27 Texas A&M* 6 or 6:30 p.m./ESPN2
Jan. 30 Texas Tech$ 3 p.m./ESPNU
Feb. 3 at Florida* 6 p.m./SECN
Feb. 6 Tennessee* 7 p.m./SECN
Feb. 9 at Mississippi State* 8 p.m./SECN
Feb. 13 at Ole Miss* 1 p.m./ESPNU
Feb. 17 Auburn* 6 p.m./SECN
Feb. 20 Missouri* 6:30 p.m./SECN
Feb. 23 LSU* 6 p.m./ESPN/SECN
Feb. 27 at Tennessee* 6:30 p.m./SECN
March 2 at Alabama* 8 p.m./SECN
March 5 South Carolina* 4 p.m./SECN
March 9-13 SEC Tournament
Nashville, Tenn. ^Exhibition
&NIT Tip Off
@at Brooklyn, N.Y.
!at Verizon Arena, North Little Rock
*SEC game
$SEC/Big 12 Challenge