Larry Hart has come home to Conway, and he has a strong message for his charges on the University of Central Arkansas football team: Get that degree.
“You learn pretty quick that having that degree is extremely important, and not only having the degree, but having a plan if the NFL doesn’t work,” said Hart, 29, a two-time All-American defensive end for the UCA Bears and a fifth-round pick in the 2010 NFL Draft.
Hart, fourth in career sacks with 21.5 in two seasons at UCA, returned officially to his alma mater on Aug. 1 when he was hired to coach the defensive line after Dan Augustine’s resignation on the eve of the season.
Hart had left UCA in December 2009, 18 hours short of his degree in health sciences. In spring 2010, the Jacksonville Jaguars drafted him as the 143rd overall pick. Hart played two seasons in Jacksonville and also spent time with the Green Bay Packers and Oakland Raiders, as well as with the Canadian Football League’s Calgary Stampeders and the United Football League’s Virginia Destroyers.
“I thought I was going to play for quite a while, like everybody else does,” he said. “I thought I’d play for eight years or so, save up my money, do it the right way and not have to go back to school.
“I can’t say I was a big fan of school, so I was thinking ‘NFL, NFL, NFL’ to get away from school.”
Now, as a coach, Hart is using those experiences as examples.
“What I try to tell these kids is that their chances of getting to that level and playing for an extended period of time [in the NFL] are slim to none,” he said. “I think it’s something like 1 percent of college students who wind up playing in the NFL, so I try to share my experiences with these guys and tell them how important it is to get a degree and have a plan of action to put yourself in position to get a decent job afterward.”
Hart played at Madison (Mississippi) Central High School and Holmes (Mississippi) Community College before transferring to UCA in 2008. After his professional career ended, he worked in personal training in Florida before returning to UCA in summer 2013 to finish the final 18 hours of his degree while working as a strength-and-conditioning intern. He graduated in August 2013.
“I had always thought about coaching, always kind of wanted to coach,” he said. “I’ve loved the game of football since I fell in love with it in ninth grade. I’d always wondered how guys get into coaching.”
After graduation, Hart returned to Jacksonville and continued his work in personal training. But in December 2013, his position coach at UCA, Brian Early, took the defensive-line job at Arkansas State University.
“We always had a good relationship, and we stayed in contact,” Hart said. “He called me to see if I was interested in potentially doing a graduate assistantship.
“I told him, ‘Yeah, man, I’ll do it.’ I left a pretty good job making decent money to make something like $800 a month as a GA.”
But Hart gained something more important during his two years at ASU — a master’s degree in communication.
“I could’ve stuck around for another year because NCAA rules allow a school to have a GA three years,” Hart said.
Instead, his first alma mater, Holmes CC, hired him as defensive line coach in March.
“As a GA, you get a little hands-on with players, but when you go full time, those guys are your guys,” he said. “You get to mold and shape them. I was having a blast.”
But it wasn’t long until his other alma mater came calling.
“I played for Coach Augustine in 2009, and we always stayed in contact,” Hart said. “When he decided to leave, he shot me a text and said, ‘If you want to throw your name in the hat, do it.’ So I threw my name in, and coach [Steve] Campbell called me. Within two or three days, I had the job here.”
So instead of continuing preparations for Holmes’ season opener, Hart moved back to Conway.
“That experience at Holmes really helped me for UCA,” Hart said. “As a full-time coach, you’ve got to learn those things you didn’t get as a GA. That experience at the juco helped me get this job.”
Campbell hadn’t known Hart, but with their respective ties to Mississippi — Campbell coached at Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College while Hart played for Holmes — they were familiar with each other.
“I kind of followed him a little bit when he was [at UCA],” Campbell said. “I try to keep up with all the guys that are in that [Mississippi junior college] league, and I knew he had a great career here.
“I had a lot of guys who either coached for me over the years or coached with me that have crossed paths with Larry on various levels. They all really gave him tremendous recommendations — what a great person he was, high character, not to mention he was a great football player and all that goes with that. But the biggest thing was what a great guy he was, and what a great mentor he’d be for our young men.”
Hart did have ties with others on the UCA staff, and some of the 2016 Bear seniors were underclassmen when Hart was finishing his degree and working in strength and conditioning.
He said returning has been “awesome.”
“It’s been a lot of fun and really enjoyable,” he said. “It’s kind of still surreal that I got this opportunity.”
Campbell, though, called the decision to hire Hart “a no-brainer.”
“You could search far and wide and not find a former UCA All-American with NFL ties who is coming from one of your recruiting footprints,” he said. “You could do a search and leave it open for six months, and there wouldn’t be anybody who checks as many boxes as he does.”
Hart, who met his wife, Juliet, while in Jacksonville, said the couple have learned to allow God to order their steps.
“I’ve seen how things unfold, and whatever door he opens, that’s where he wants us to go, and whatever door he closes, that’s where he doesn’t want us to go,” Hart said. “I think it’s obvious that he’s closed some doors I wanted. But lo and behold, with all those closing, the right doors opened up and led me to this job.
“We just believe at the end of the day God is going to order our steps. If that’s one year here, two years, 10 years, 15 years, we want to rely on our faith in God to lead us the right way.”