FAYETTEVILLE — It may not go towards either team's record, but Saturday's exhibition between No. 12 Arkansas and No. 15 Gonzaga certainly means something to both squads.
For the Razorbacks, especially the eight freshmen on John Calipari's roster, their first game action inside Bud Walton Arena wthis season will matter a great deal.
"I heard a lot of people say the exhibition doesn't really matter," freshman guard Jordan Smith Jr. said Tuesday. "But for us, it does matter. Any progress, little progress is the best progress. Just for us to get better overall in this exhibition game, it's really [did] a lot for us."
"You're going to see it by the energy that my teammates and me gonna bring," said junior guard Billy Richmond III. "Everybody just eager to get out there. You know, you can even see it in practice. They don't want to practice. They want to play, experience what it's going to be during the season from the fans' perspective, the team's perspective... they get to see it all, and we've been putting all this work in."
Saturday's game is not the first time the Hogs have played a high profile opponent in Fayetteville in an exhibition event. The Razorbacks beat Cincinnati in BWA last year and then-No. 1 Kansas in John Calipari's first unofficial game as the head coach at Arkansas. In Eric Musselman's final season in Fayetteville, the Razorbacks beat Purdue 81-77 in an exhibition game that went into overtime.
A similarly competitive contest between the Hogs and the Bulldogs on Saturday wouldn't be surprising.
"[Gonzaga head coach Mark Few] and I talked the other day," Calipari said. "I said, 'Do you have your zone in yet?' 'Nope, I have no zone.' I go, 'Great. Neither one of us are playing zone.'"
Calipari said both coaches agreed to press during Saturday's game so both teams could turn the ball over and the coaches would "have something to teach."
"I told him our out of bounds plays, this is what we have," Calipari said. "He told me his out of bounds plays. We're friends. I want it to be a war. When you're playing this type of team, there are times you're saying, 'I hope we get beat so I can grab the attention of this team.'
"I just tell everybody, come and enjoy watching these guys. We've been beat up a little bit, but we've had more than I've had other years when I'm playing five and six guys. We should have a full roster of 10, 11 being able to play in that game."
Tip-off between Arkansas and Gonzaga is set for 3 p.m. on Saturday inside Bud Walton Arena, with coverage on SEC Network+ and the Razorback Sports Network.
Sign up to our free newsletter, and follow us on Facebook, X (Twitter) for the latest news.
Add us as a preferred source on Google