FAYETTEVILLE -- Everyone knows NRA is the acronym for the National Rifle Association.
Fortunately, NRA also isn't an acronym for No Razorbacks Allowed.
NRA could have stood for such if the Arkansas Senate and Arkansas House of Representatives hadn't modified legislation set for 2018 to allow concealed firearms to be carried on Arkansas' college campuses by those fulfilling an "enhanced training" course.
The apparently belated realization that Act 562 -- opposed by all state college administrations but signed into law by Gov. Asa Hutchinson -- had morphed to allow fans carrying concealed weapons into collegiate athletic events caused the revisions provided in Senate Bill 724. The Senate agreed to the amendment bill Friday to return the right of the state's colleges to prohibit firearms at athletic events. The House on Thursday voted approval.
Without the amendment, it seems the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville and its Razorbacks could have been voted out of the SEC. Arkansas State University and its Red Wolves and the University of Arkansas at Little Rock Trojans also could have been on shaky ground with the Sun Belt Conference.
From this view, SEC Commissioner Greg Sankey and Sun Belt Commissioner Karl Benson weren't bluffing when expressing concerns that could have left the Razorbacks, Red Wolves and Trojans without a conference home.
Take heed of Sankey's statement.
"Given the intense atmosphere surrounding athletic events, adding weapons increases safety concerns and could negatively impact the intercollegiate athletics program at the University of Arkansas in several ways, including scheduling, officiating, recruiting and attendance," Sankey said.
Sankey added that it "creates concerns for the Southeastern Conference and its member institutions."
Benson cited "my colleague Greg Sankey" in supporting Bill 724 to keep the guns away from Arkansas' stadiums and arenas.
Those initial concerns by the conference commissioners likely would have become conference expulsion for the schools.
Arkansas' colleges likely would have found no takers to play nonconference games in Arkansas. No athletic director in good conscience can send their athletes, coaches and fans into an arena fearing they are literally under the gun.
Good luck on getting officiating crews to work games while thinking the unthinkable.
Good luck getting ushers to inform patrons who they think might be armed that they are in the wrong seats.
That a representative from Fayetteville, Charlie Collins, opened this Pandora's box with legislation forcing the colleges to accept what they didn't want and then frantically walked it back by sponsoring Bill 724 emphatically shows the devastating economic impact the guns at games approval could have wrought.
It wasn't going over big in Jonesboro.
"A recipe for disaster," Arkansas State Football Coach Blake Anderson said.
Half-baked recipes usually are.
Sports on 04/01/2017