Is Razorbacks basketball success reality or just another fever dream?

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — It was the first sign that something had dramatically changed.

There I was in a clinical examination room trying to explain to the doctors something terrible had happened to my family, but I couldn't remember what it was. A police officer learned forward from his chair in the corner and asked if there was some way the medical staff could force my brain to show me what took place.

After a moment of staring me down as if trying to look at the information written directly on my brain, the lead doctor suggested they put me in a controlled sleep and monitor my dreams. With the right bit of suggestive audio playing softly while I slept, I would be able to reproduce what happened and they could discern what I saw on their end.

Next thing I know, I am forced into a dream where I am seeing the most awful things happening. I want out. I can't continue watching this so I scream at the top of my lungs.

"Help me! Please get me out of here!
I can't do this! Help! Help!"

I was desperate, but each scream hit this false ceiling in my dream and rebounded back as dampered noise. Help wasn't coming.

But it did. In the real world, for the first time, my wife witnessed me having a night terror. Except, on her end, it looked like a traumatic medical emergency. I was thrashing and letting out wild, terrifying moans.

Finally, she got me to wake briefly, which immediately made everything stop. She tried to talk to me, but my body had already crashed back into an exhausted, but more peaceful sleep.

Assured I was OK, she allowed herself to fall back into a restless sleep.

I haven't dreamed in a way that I was capable of remembering since Freddy Kreuger popped out and attacked me from behind the dry cleaner across from the YMCA in Warren when I was a small child. However, with this latest adjustment in medicines and treatment in my battle with cancer, the dreams are clearly back.

And it took literally one day for them to switch over to incorporating the Arkansas Razorbacks. After all, pretty much any moment that isn't devoted to thinking about how best to take care of my family is set aside to analyzing and thinking about all things Hogs.

Only, this time, it was impossible to tell where the dreams ended and real life began.

It started rather innocent and random. I was back stage at a wrestling event in a bit of a first person perspective. It didn't take long to realize I was essentially Ric Flair.

I could see the shimmering robe draping off my forearms and could feel a thousand smooth one-liners rolling through my head just waiting for me to hit the play button on a trash talking promo that would suck in the crowd at a moment's notice.

My music hit and I made my way to the ring. Half the people despised me, telling me so with as many four letter words and phlegm as possible.

The other half adored me. Wanted to be me.

I made my way to the ring, fully confident I was not only going to put on a great show, but about to walk out with the gold. Then it hit me.

I needed to write my preview on the Arkansas game at Auburn. Next thing I know, I am immediately transported from the ring to a small wooden desk in a dimly lit room where my fingers glided across a typewriter.

Nothing registered as out of the ordinary. Instead, I filled the paper while following my usual writing process. It all felt like I woke up from a dream and got right to work in the real world.

I put together a story that carefully covered how it would be a battle between the top two contenders for SEC Player of the Year, Darius Acuff and Auburn's Keyshawn Hall. The story then turned to how even though the names were the same, Calipari vs. Pearl, it was a much different battle between coaches that would give things a drastically different feel.

After all, while there's a lot to be absorbed as the son of the legendary Bruce Pearl, it's a vastly different for Calipari than facing the real thing. The only concerning aspect is, for the moment, Steven Pearl has the element of surprise as he has potential unpredictability created by inexperience.

Lastly, it also covered how the atmosphere would challenge Arkansas. Auburn is always so hard to play because of the students packed in the lower bowl by what feels like the thousands, filling up the hard camera angle with as many crazies as possible.

Before long, in what felt like a normal amount of time spent writing a similar piece the real world, I submitted the story. That element of literally writing the entire story and feeling the time pass is what ultimately lead to the confusion.

Once it was submitted, I settled down to watch the Razorbacks game and, again, without thinking anything was out of the ordinary, took in a preview package put together by ESPN for Arkansas vs. VMI. It talked about VMI standing for Virginia Military Institute and how that had been the theme to the schedule Calipari put together as it featured literally all of the military schools.

The Razorbacks had easily run through each, but today they faced the most powerful of them all, VMI, a program that had quietly formed into the new Gonzaga, going undefeated so far this season because the nation's top center is the son of a military commander who wants to follow in his footsteps and he convinced a few Too 100 players to join him and the Keydets.

Right as the tip was about to take place, my wife woke me. I was in a hazy fog of exhaustion, unable to discern reality from the dreams. I had to take my next round of meds, so I kept myself awake just long enough to do that without hardly moving from my spot in bed.

Quickly I was out again, headed for the next round of strange dreams, but at least happy that I had managed to write and submit my story earlier.

Obviously, multiple hours later, I put together that I didn't actually write that story in the real world. However, let it be known that every word written in the dream was accurate.

This is going to be a major battle between Acuff and Hall that may very well determine which ultimately wins SEC Player of the Year. Calipari is also going to have a decided advantage, although Pearl doing something that makes no sense to a more experienced coach might cause problems at some point.

Also, over the past five years or so, there hasn't been a place with as great of an atmosphere as Auburn. Letting students occupy the prime seating along the sidelines from baseline to baseline right in front of the hard camera makes it look like the most intimidating place ever to play despite the arena being so small.

As for the military schedule, there are no clues in the real world as to where that came from. However, if Calipari put together a schedule that replaced the likes of Queens and James Madison with VMI, Army, Navy and Air Force, that not only wouldn't be surprising, it would be a welcome gesture.

Who knows how long the medications and treatments will keep these dreams coming. The current goop they pump into my body supposedly turns it into an immunity super hero that attacks the cancer cells and beats them back into normal cells by rewriting their DNA.

Doing so is extremely exhausting. It's the body working as if it's fighting COVID, the flu and pneumonia all at once.

However, as things stand, I'm not the only one experiencing dreams. There's are multiple generations who didn't witness the 1994 and 1995 Razorbacks basketball seasons.

Therefore, this year is much like a dream for them. There's legitimate hope of experiencing a national championship run.

Should that include a win on the road at Auburn, that dream becomes even closer to reality. Let's just hope that this time I actually wrote about it and this all isn't just another fever dream that can't be discerned from reality.

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