Hogs' coaching search needs to include highly talented under the radar target

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — With the Bobby Petrino era officially crashed once again and Razorbacks fans locked in on the beginning of what is a promising basketball season, Arkansas athletics director Hunter Yurachek has to turn his coaching search up another gear.

There was once an easy option. If Petrino could just knock off a hapless Auburn program in the process of nosediving into its own coaching search, then take down either Mississippi State, Texas or LSU, all slipping into their own tail spins, then Yurachek could justify making an easy hire with plenty of local support.

Now, that option is gone. Instead, the Hogs have fallen into direct competition with what some have projected may be as many as 25 openings in Division I after the calendar and uncertainty of revenue sharing legislation kept literally everyone from firing their coaches last season.

In Arkansas' case, it wouldn't have made sense to move on from Sam Pittman last year either way. The Hogs had another winning season under their belt, along with the promise of a second season with Petrino at offensive coordinator with second year quarterback Taylen Green and a plan to massively upgrade the offensive line.

Unfortunately, a season where there appeared to be enough talent on the team to test the College Football Playoff waters fell by the wayside as the offense and defense couldn't get their good performances to take place at the same time, dropping Yurachek into quite the pickle.

With schools like Penn State, LSU, Florida and possibly Florida State on the hunt, the Razorbacks will be pretty far down the pecking order. There's also word that Steve Sarkisian is looking to shed himself of the albatross that is Arch Manning in Texas by leaping to the NFL before anyone else can say it's bad play calling rather than the obvious below average quarterback skills that hold the Longhorns back a second year.

With each opening, Arkansas slips a little further down. Add in that a lot of the potential candidates are Jimmy Sexton clients, and it looks like what will be out there will be overly expensive.

As a result, Yurachek has to turn over every rock possible. A lot of the usual, uninspiring suspects have been discussed, but there is one candidate whom almost no one knows about who will work his way onto the list also, albeit maybe not at the top since Arkansas fans won't be familiar with his name.

At Kennesaw State, a program many Razorbacks fans have not heard of, is a man by the name of Jerry Mack. There are a lot of reasons they don't know him yet, and plenty why they should.

The biggest reason for the obscurity is the Owls have only been playing football for a few years after former legendary SEC athletics director Vince Dooley convinced the school to start a football program in 2015 at the Georgia university that now boasts over 50,000 students.

Brian Bohannan was tasked with being the first coach, and he got the program rolling quickly. By 2017 he had the first of three consecutive 11+ win seasons followed by another in 2021 after a 4-1 campaign during COVID.

The Owls finished in the FCS Top 10 four out of five seasons. However, when it came time to make the jump to FBS as a member of Conference USA, Bohannan wasn't up to the task.

In the transition years, Kennesaw State slipped to 5-6, then 3-6, and, in their debut season as part of Conference USA, they became a staple of the ESPN Bottom 10 with a 2-10 record.

Enter Mack, a former Arkansas State wide receiver from Memphis in his mid-40s. He served time as an assistant at Central Arkansas, Arkansas-Pine Bluff and Memphis before becoming head coach at North Carolina Central at age 34.

There he went 31-15 in four seasons, including an appearance in the Celebration Bowl, the highest honor an HBCU school can achieve. His offense set school records and he was named HBCU Coach of the Year by multiple outlets.

Having maxed out his accomplishments, he set his sights toward earning a more prominent football coaching job. That meant stepping back out into the world of assistant coaching.

This time he started as offensive coordinator and associate head coach at Rice before moving to Tennessee where he coached running backs in 2021 and then the NFL with the Jacksonville Jaguars as running backs coach in 2024.

When Kennesaw State opened, it wasn't the high profile job he had hoped for, but it was a Division I post at a Group of Five school, meaning if he could win there, the next jump was Power Four. While Bohannan, who had proven himself unstoppable as an FCS coach, struggled to gain traction with the Owls, Mack stepped in and immediately turned things around.

Despite not being at a high money school, his offensive prowess and recruiting skills proved attractive enough for things to not just get better, but exponentially better. The Owls jumped from the basement of the ESPN Bottom 10 to the top of the Conference USA standings.

Mack stunned everyone by orchestrating a 10-9 upset alert loss at Wake Forest, a team that is currently 5-2 and still in the hunt for the ACC championship. He then took his team to Indiana where the Owls performed pretty much the same as every other Power Four team that was supposed to be a threat that wandered into Bloomington.

However, after that, the Owls started winning and haven't looked back. Along the way, Mack led his team against his alma mater, an Arkansas State team riding the semi-high of having the referees rip away a home win over a ranked Iowa State team the week before.

Mack's quarterback, Amari Odom, completed 25-of-34 passes for 308 yards and a touchdown. In addition, Odom added 101 yards on 16 carries and a touchdown to complement another 98 yards courtesy of the running back room in a 28-21 road victory that proves to be more important every week as the Red Wolves continue to stack wins.

Mack has a lot of the qualities Arkansas fans love in Petrino. He runs a high powered offense with an exciting quarterback at the helm.

He also knows the areas the Razorbacks need to recruit inside and out. He has spent countless years scouring Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Tennessee and Georgia for talent he can develop into someone who can win at a high level.

Most importantly, his teams play defense. Taking out the Indiana game, the Owls have only given up 15 points per game, and that includes the road trip to a Wake Forest team that should have easily overpowered them on paper.

In addition to winning, Mack isn't afraid to step out and do a few things that connect with the community and recruits that reflect current pop culture. For instance, one popular thing to do with celebrities is to have them reveal questions searched about them on the internet by peeling a card and answering questions.

Mack did a similar video in an effort to help the people at Kennesaw State get to know him.

The other quality he brings to the table is an ability to speak with confidence and in a pointed manner during his press conferences. Mack doesn't have the ailment Pittman had of looking uncomfortable and unsure in his responses.

Instead, he not only answers quickly and with authority, but he does so in a plain, honest manner that helped Arkansas fans believe in Petrino after the shift. If Mack gets the job, the days of not being able to answer a question without a feeling of strong strategic thought behind it will be over.

So, while Mack may not be currently at the top of the list for fans, or on it at all since most don't know him, there's good cause for Yurachek to keep him in mind. He's at an age where he is old enough and experienced enough to be able to handle difficult situations during the game, but young enough to still relate well to players.

His knowledge of the area, including Arkansas, offers an edge many candidates won't have. He has the advantage of having witnessed the passion and traditions the state has for the Razorbacks firsthand while also being able to provide an outsider's perspective.

He's a quality blend of both sides of the coin. There's a good chance Arkansas fans won't see Mack walking the sidelines of Razorback Stadium, but, if they do, the Hogs will be in much better hands than most would think.

Mack would be a hire more along the lines of Houston Nutt. Someone at that perfect age who still has the ability to light a fire in young men and relate to them while being willing and able to connect to the state.

He might not end up being Yurachek's hire for now, but he at the very least needs to be high up on the radar and under consideration for a future hire.

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