Texas Plots Against A&M Demonstrate Hate Arkansas Wishes It Faced from Someone

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — Arkansas has wanted a rival for the better part of 30+ years and has come close to building one a time or two.

However, for those who think the Razorbacks have ever built up a true rivalry, understand that something on that level requires a team to look at the Hogs the way Texas looks at Texas A&M. The Longhorns have been in the SEC for a single year, yet they made it their mission to decimate the Aggies athletics program from before they even officially set foot in the league.

This time last season, Jim Schlossnagle was in the early SEC part of a 53-win season that had the Aggies a run away from winning a national championship. However, before the national championship series with Tennessee was even settled, the Longhorns had already swooped in and stolen Texas A&M's coach.

Last night, Jim Schlossnagle was asked about the rumors of another opening in college baseball, his response: "I took the job at Texas A&M to never take another job again"

24 hours later: He is announced as the new head coach at Texas.

FUN TIMES

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— GopherHole.com (@GopherHole) June 25, 2024

Now that's hate. As a result the Aggies are 14-14 this season and in three weeks they have to drive over to Austin to visit their old coach who has currently led the Longhorns to a 23-4 record.

Even before then, Texas somehow circumvented the general rule that no schools could be admitted to the SEC from a state that already has an SEC team without approval of said team. Not only did the Longhorns get in without Texas A&M knowing, they managed to have the news break in the middle of the Aggies' SEC media press conference.

What a resounding opening statement it was. It was the ultimate troll move and it shook Texas A&M to its core.

There's no institution that cares about Arkansas so deeply that it's willing to go to those lengths. There's a single person who would if he could, but that will be addressed later.

Texas A&M was even on the Longhorns' mind when the date was set for Texas to join the SEC. There was so much speculation as to whether there would be strings pulled to move the Longhorns and Oklahoma Sooners into the league early, but that was not going to happen.

While the Aggies threatened to dominate the college football world with its endless supply of money for NIL, Texas patiently hired Steve Sarkisian out from under the Nick Saban tree of learning and gave him time to build an SEC caliber team at the expense of the Big 12.

They even tested themselves against Arkansas and Alabama to measure their progress before finally facing Texas A&M in their inaugural SEC season. By then, the Longhorns had grown so much they were among the college football monsters while the Aggies' mismanaged funds had digressed them into something between mediocre and a college football doormat the last couple of years.

Morale in College Station has gotten so low that A&M's arrogance and deep pockets got duped by Ole Miss basketball. It seemed certain they were going to be able to lure away the Rebels' Chris Beard, a move that could have been seen as a direct shot at Texas considering the past between Beard and the Longhorns.

However, in an old move made famous by former Arkansas coach Houston Nutt, Beard stayed put after drumming up interest elsewhere. The feud is so petty that it wouldn't be surprising to hear Texas got wind of Beard reaching out to A&M and had some of its boosters slip a little cash to Ole Miss so the Rebels could make him an offer he couldn't refuse.

While it seems silly, it's nowhere near out of the realm of possibility. That will never be pondered when it comes to Arkansas.

Technically, Missouri football coach Eli Drinkwitz views Arkansas in a similar fashion, but that's one man, not an entire program. Also, it's just borderline impossible to get Razorbacks fans to feel the same way.

While there's a little something with Missouri in basketball, if the Hogs' football team were to win two or three games in a row, things would settle back down to it's normal apathetic level on the Arkansas side. Razorbacks fans want to beat Drinkwitz because they are tired of his antics and desperate pleas for attention from his home state.

This has nothing to do with Missouri. If Drinkwitz were doing this every year at Mississippi State, it not only would be the same thing, but it might mean a little more because there's at least a little desire to care about the Bulldogs.

It's not that there haven't been attempts to form rivalries for Arkansas. First it was Tennessee and South Carolina.

Unfortunately, the Gamecocks were too far away and too unknown in Arkansas and the Razorbacks football team fell off too far for anything real to develop in those days with Tennessee. It couldnt' have been saved even if David Bazzel had developed the foresight to create a giant pistol trophy made of gold in the shape of the two states.

The LSU rivalry got a decent swing and actually built a little something through close games on the football field each Thanksgiving, monster match-ups on the baseball field and occasional big showdowns on the basketball court, but, alas, the SEC took it away to placate the Aggies.

So, Arkansas got saddled with Missouri because no one else wanted them and it's only reached a point in the past year or two where Razorbacks fans remember the Tigers are on the schedule. That leaves Ole Miss, which, on paper, should be a team that fits the bill.

The two have played forever despite not being in the same conference for most of their existence and the football series has been relatively even. The two schools care a great deal about baseball, the Beard vs. John Calipari battle each year is showing promise, and the storyline of Lane Kiffin almost taking the Arkansas job that Sam Pittman eventually took has legs to build on.

The Razorbacks even killed the Rebels' chance of an SEC championship with the 4th & 25 play and Ole Miss stole Nutt at the end of the Peyton HIllis, Felix Jones, Darren McFadden era. There's a lot to work with.

There's even the seven overtime thriller between Matt Jones and Eli Manning. Even the series between Pittman and Kiffin has been back and forth.

Unfortunately, while it's must-watch television when these two programs hook up, there's just no animosity. Perhaps the two states relate to each other too much, so it's hard to find hate for the other.

So, while teams may find pleasure in taking down Arkansas every now and then, no one has the deeply seeded disdain to actively plot and plan against the Hogs' entire program. No school will ever see the Razorbacks the way Texas looks at Texas A&M.

It means something will always be missing for the fans. It's also why the future will always hold forced pseudo-rivalries that will just have to do.

Life is just destined to be hard for a program and its fans that just can't find a way to properly be hated.

Texas Plots Against A&M Demonstrate Hate Arkansas Wishes It Faced from Someone

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