Razorbacks Not Giving Nick Smith Good Reason to Come Back

Unless Hogs go 3-3 in next few weeks, there will too high risk, too little reward for guard to return

Author:
Kent Smith
Publish date:
Jan 15, 2023 12:43 AM EST

In this story:

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. – If the Razorbacks were hoping to play in such a way as to convince Nick Smith, Jr. it might be worth the risk to come back and make a run at a national championship, that argument is starting to lose steam.

Vanderbilt was to be the beginning of a stretch of games that might possibly allow Arkansas to regain its footing while Eric Musselman fine-tuned the line-up just in time to make a run at a Top 3 seed in the NCAA Tournament.

Instead, the Razorbacks come out of the weekend in a three-way tie with LSU and Mississippi State for next to last place in the Southeastern Conference and will most likely fall out of the Top 25 prior to traveling to Missouri later this week.

If February really is the target for making a decision on whether Smith will ever play again in an Arkansas uniform, this team will need to find a way to split the next six games to push their record to 15-8.

Should this skid continue on its current trajectory, the resulting 13-10 record would make it highly unlikely that Smith's handlers would let him contemplate a return. The risk would be too high for a reward that would be improbable.

At that point, the big question then becomes whether the remaining players who think they may go in the NBA draft would play in the NIT or call it a career much in the way Daniel Gafford did a few years ago.

If that were to happen, the athletic department would be faced with a decision similar to the one the football team almost had to have at the end of its season – whether to continue in the postseason in the face of minimal numbers.

Obviously, this is a worst-case scenario that would be hard for Razorback fans to even force themselves to consider a possibility.

But, then again, so was losing to Vanderbilt for the second year in a row while staring down a potential showdown with Ole Miss for the league cellar just a few months ago.