FAYETTEVILLE — Arkansas will be trying to add to its trophy case Friday afternoon when it takes on Missouri.
A win over the Tigers would give the Razorbacks the first Battle Line Trophy to go alongside the Golden Boot outside Arkansas' locker room.
“It definitely adds more to the game,” safety Rohan Gaines said. “Everybody wants to win the trophy. It gives us a little extra motivation to go out there and actually do it.”
At 4 feet, 4 inches and 180 pounds, the Battle Line Trophy is larger than the Golden Boot (4 feet, 175 pounds). It was designed by former Arkansas linebacker David Bazzel, who also designed the Golden Boot nearly 20 years ago.
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“(It’s a) heavy sucker,” Arkansas coach Bret Bielema said. “It sounds like a midget three-technique. I like the looks of it. It looks classy and hopefully it’s something we can build upon.”
Some fans were upset when Missouri replaced LSU as the Razorbacks’ opponent on Thanksgiving weekend, but quarterback Brandon Allen said he thinks the game will evolve into a similar rivalry.
“I think it’s going to build into (a rivalry),” Allen said. “It’s tough when you first start a rivalry and you start saying it’s a rivalry game, but with time and more games played and you go back and forth a bunch of times, I think it’ll turn into a really good one.”
Adding a trophy to the mix should speed that process up, said linebackers coach Vernon Hargreaves.
He thinks the postgame reaction of the winning team, celebrating with the trophy, will cause the losing team to want to win the rematch even more than they normally would.
“When you start one, the first time somebody gets it, then it’ll be, ‘OK, it’s time for us to go get it,’” Hargreaves said. “When you see somebody go take it and see what it looks like, I think that’s when it starts to dawn on the other team.”
Bielema said he likes trophy games. At Wisconsin, he coached in one of the nation's most famous trophy games against Minnesota.
In addition to games against LSU and Missouri, Arkansas also competes for an annual trophy against Texas A&M.
“People go crazy for those things,” Bielema said. “It’s really amazing. There’s uniqueness to it, battling for a trophy. It means so much to the fan base.”
Allen said he hasn’t seen the trophy and doesn’t even know what it looks like, but he’s ready to get another shot at the Tigers. Missouri scored 15 points in the fourth quarter to beat Arkansas 21-14 last season in the team's first meeting in the same conference.
That win clinched Missouri's second consecutive SEC East championship and fans rushed the field.
“Any time you lose to a team and get a chance to play them again the next year, there’s always that kind of grudge match,” Allen said. “You obviously want to perform well and do better than the year before.
“It’s our shot at redemption (against) them.”