Let’s call it what it was. Arkansas’ 2018 season was a mess.

Low expectations for the first year of the Chad Morris era weren’t met, at least from an on-field standpoint. The Hogs went winless in SEC play with an average margin of defeat of 23 points. That wasn’t as bad as the 27-point beatdown they suffered at home against North Texas, nor was any loss as embarrassing as the collapse at Colorado State (the Rams only won 3 games in 2019).

Arkansas went 1-10 against FBS competition, and 0-9 against FBS teams that won at least 4 games in 2018. Yikes.

Many Razorback fans are hopeful about the future in part because of the recruiting class that Morris signed, and it appears that the transition from the Bret Bielema roster is entering a new phase.

I’ll refrain making another “lipstick on a pig” joke and instead spend my time looking at something that hasn’t been beaten into the ground. That is, what does recent history suggest about seasons as bad as Arkansas in the SEC? Is significant improvement imminent? Is there a light at the end of the tunnel?

I took a closer look at the 8 SEC teams in the past decade that went winless in conference play to see how things played out after their goose egg.

[table “” not found /]

The first thing you’d probably notice about that is how wide-ranging it is. You had 2013 Auburn, which obviously pulled off one of the most stunning year-to-year turnarounds in college football history. You also had a season like 2012 Kentucky, which repeated its SEC play goose egg the following year.

You might have noticed that the “first-year coach” question had a wide range of outcomes in terms of projecting long-term success.

Mark Stoops didn’t win an SEC game in his first season. Most recently, he won SEC Coach of the Year after delivering Kentucky’s best season in 4 decades. You also had Derek Mason, who struggled mightily in Year 1 at Vanderbilt but is now starting to establish some consistency having been to bowl games in 2 of the past 3 years (that only happened 1 other time in program history).

And then there was Bielema. Everyone remembers that rocky 2013 season in Fayetteville. Even though Bielema bounced back the following year by winning 7 games, his tenure was still ultimately deemed a failure.

But while that chart was a bit all over the place, there was a consensus — that’s rock bottom. Nobody somehow got worse.

Here’s the breakdown of the averages for 0-8 SEC teams following their winless season in conference play:

  • SEC win total increase: 2.4
  • Overall win total increase: 2.9

Theoretically, that would project Arkansas for 5-7 overall mark and a 2-6 SEC record before ending the bowl drought in 2020. That’s of course extremely hypothetical. Anybody who watched Arkansas in 2018 would tell you that team was more than a couple plays away from bowl eligibility.

Still, some are already suggesting there’s a path to the postseason in 2019. It’s a combination of Arkansas facing just 8 Power 5 teams (that’s the fewest of any Power 5 team) with a nonconference schedule against 3 Group of 5 teams who missed bowl games and FCS Portland State. All of those nonconference games will be played in Fayetteville, too.

If Arkansas doesn’t at least double its win total in 2019, it’d be fair to have serious doubts about Morris. And for what it’s worth, all of the 0-8 SEC teams in the past decade that had first-year coaches won 2 SEC games the following year. Morris is hoping to join that club.

It seems like he has a sense of urgency when it comes to the way he’s rebuilding the roster, and not just as a relentless recruiter at the high school level. In a room full of promising young quarterback options, Morris went out and brought in SMU grad transfer Ben Hicks, whom he coached before coming to Arkansas. Morris also tried to land Clemson transfer Kelly Bryant and he’s still trying to land Texas A&M transfer Nick Starkel.

And in his second season, Morris is shaking things up internally, too. He stripped the program of all Razorback gear. That included himself.

https://twitter.com/RazorbackFB/status/1092410291265114112

Will Morris’ new approach work? And if so, how long will it take?

Everyone knew this was going to be a legitimate rebuild and not a a 1-year fix. Maybe 2018 shed some light on how massive of a rebuilding project it would be for Morris to play his style in the SEC West. Surely the hope was that Arkansas would have better than the No. 114 offense in America with Morris running the show. There could be more tough times ahead in Fayetteville before Morris’ recruiting prowess is evident.

Does that mean Arkansas is destined to follow the 2012-13 Kentucky path? Of course not. But based on what we saw last year, I’d say that scenario is probably more likely than the 2012-13 Auburn path.

Not that Arkansas fans needed any reminders of Gus Malzahn’s exploits.