[00:00:00] Speaker A: Welcome in. We've got Doug Case, the Arkansas men's track coach, the two time national champion, here with us at the desk today. We're going to talk to him about the Razorbacks winning the national championship over the weekend in Eugene, Oregon. First, want to tell you that our podcast is brought to you by Eglins Best in Arkansas. Greatness starts early, before the pads go on. Before the crowd roars, the day begins at the breakfast table. Eglin's Best delivers superior nutrition with vitamin D and less saturated fat than ordinary eggs. You can start strong with Eglund's Best Bag. Better taste, better nutrition and better eggs. Also brought to you by Bentonville Glass. They've been serving their community since 1971. They're committed, professional and versatile. If you're looking for a quality leader in northwest Arkansas or looking for skilled craftsmanship, look no further than Bentonville Glass for all your glass market needs with the highest quality products. You can come by and see them now at 507 South Main in Bentonville or online at bentonvilleglass.com Appreciate you joining us wherever you are. Maybe you're watching us on YouTube. We put this on our social media, social media channels on Facebook and Twitter. You can also find our podcasts on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Just search Whole Hog Sports Doug Case is the first coach. You've heard this I think quite a few times here lately.
In 44 years, 1982 was the last time a coach won conference indoor and outdoor and national indoor and outdoor titles. First off, congratulations.
[00:01:18] Speaker B: Thank you.
[00:01:19] Speaker A: Man, what a season.
When you just kind of, I know it's probably hard to kind of take a breath because your, your focus is already on next year. But like when you take a second to reflect on how this year went down and you being a first time head coach or a first year head coach here at Arkansas. I know you've been a head coach in the past. Like, like how do you, have you soaked it all in yet? I mean, how does it feel?
[00:01:41] Speaker B: I would say I have not soaked it all in yet.
Yeah, it's pretty amazing. I think the overall experience of this year has been, it's been incredible. I think it was for our athletes. I think it our full coaching staff from, I mean all the way from our equipment coordinator to our strength staff to our trainers. I mean it was just a great year.
I know the athletes enjoyed it. Anytime you win something like that, you know the emotions are high and it was just a lot of fun. It's a lot of fun.
[00:02:10] Speaker A: What went well for you in Eugene,
[00:02:13] Speaker B: you know, we did a lot of great things. We had a few things that didn't hit, but, you know, I think things like that 800, going second and third in the 800 with Tyrese and Rivaldo. That was a real turning point in where we were in the meet at the time. We needed that. We needed the long jump. Gerard Hughes did a great job, got second in that, and then Scotty Vines and the high jump got second. Those were all just kind of clutch, key performances. And a lot of it has to do with the timing, you know, when that happened and what the meet felt like to us, because maybe we'd had a few things didn't go our way, and then all of a sudden, someone would step up and do something big and put us right back in the hunt.
[00:02:52] Speaker A: You didn't have an individual champion.
What's that say about the depth of the team? And maybe that being the team's strength
[00:02:59] Speaker B: is depth, And I think it is, and I think that's exactly what, you know, we came into the meet with 21 athletes, I believe.
And, you know, even on the final day on. When we got to Friday, we had 10 scoring opportunities left that, you know, people had qualified through to the final. We had two in the 400, two in the 800, and two in the 5K, and then we still had both relays.
We had Jelani in the 100, and then we had the high jump. So we had. We just had a lot of stuff. You know, we had a lot of performances on Wednesday. Wednesday is the qualifying round to get into the finals on Friday. And we did a great job, I think, on Wednesday, preparing ourselves to. To win that meet, going in with 10 opportunities to score on. On Friday.
[00:03:39] Speaker A: I want to ask you about Jelani Watkins, because that was kind of the story, I felt like, of day one, the fact that he's. Was he first or second in terms of national rank going in the 200, he's running a good race. And then looks like. I mean, he just gets nipped at the end by a runner, and it looks like maybe he'd gone into cruise control a little bit. What happened there? And what did you think about the way he bounced back on Friday and ran a couple of really good races to help you out on Friday?
[00:04:05] Speaker B: Well, if you'd have been in the team meeting on Wednesday morning, you'd have known that you were supposed to run through the line. You know, that's.
But, I mean, that's a conversation we always have, you know, and because these this meet is so difficult. The competition is incredibly good. The teams are incredibly, incredibly good. And you just have to run. And I've said it before, I say it all the time. You got to run the prelims like a final. You can't, can't let up and you can't take it for granted that you're going to make it and everybody's trying to beat you. Everybody out there is a great athlete. If you qualified to go to that meet, you can make it to the final and you can score points and you just can't have a, you can't have a lapse. You know, you have to go out there and fight all the way through. And I think, you know, he felt like he was in good position and then guy on the outside just snuck in on him right at the last second. But he did jump back and ran a great 100 meter dash and ran his second best time of the year and got third in that race. And, you know, he was upset with himself on Wednesday, but I really give him a lot of credit for being that tough guy that came back and, you know, did what he had to do and knew it was a team performance thing at that point and did everything he could do to score some points for us.
[00:05:09] Speaker A: You still had a lot of scoring opportunities on Friday, which was day two. The way it works, if you're not familiar with the NCAA outdoor track meet, is the men run Wednesday and Friday. The women run Thursday and Saturday.
So how are you feeling going on, going into Friday? I mean, you didn't get anybody through in the 200. You didn't get any through in the 110 hurdles, but you still have a lot of scoring opportunities. Are you still feeling like everything's, you know, going to work out for you?
[00:05:33] Speaker B: Yeah, we. I mean, we have a great amount of depth on the team. And I've said it all year, and I'll say it again, man, we were good from the 100 to the 10k and then the field events. So we just qualified so many people into the meet that I don't even want to say it, but we had room for a little error, you know, and that meet is really about making errors. You know, it's about making errors or not making errors. And when we're running our score sheets, because we're doing it all the time, we got this printed out score sheet and we're trying to keep track of where we are, but you're also keeping track of what other people have done. And for example, in the four by One, we dropped the stick in the four by one in the final that day on Friday, but we still knew it wasn't. That it wasn't a huge disaster because we had so many other opportunities. And then the other thing you have to look at is Oregon dropped the stick as well in the four by one. So it's not all the time about what you've done. Sometimes it's about what other teams have done and what their errors are or what their performances were like. So we're just running that scorecard all the time, trying to make sure we're in it. And when we got to Friday, you know, with those 10 scoring opportunities, we just. We felt good. We felt strong about it.
[00:06:42] Speaker A: Whenever I talked to you in November, whenever you got announced as the head coach, and then I talked to you again in January, before the season, I just felt like you were very confident about this team. What made you so confident, not just in them, but, you know, a lot of people wondered, you've been a head coach before, but it's your first year being a head coach of this team. How does that play into, like, what led to that confidence that you had? Because you could really feel that. I felt all the way up to the season starting.
[00:07:06] Speaker B: I mean, I know that we did a great job recruiting through the summer, and I just knew the athletes we were brought in were just gonna. They were gonna gel. I could tell that we had a good team. I felt great about our staff, that we got hired, the new coaches we hired.
And just overall, I just felt like we, you know, we were in a good position. We'd done a lot to prepare ourselves for the season. And I can't say enough about how our coaches and our, you know, our staff and our team really, really came together, and that's what made this whole thing kind of possible. It was a. It was a great. The whole year was a great atmosphere.
In practice, at the meets, the whole. Everything. It was just a really up year. Felt really good, and everybody kind of gelled, and it gave us all confidence. It gave the coaching staff confidence, it gave the athletes confidence. And, you know, when you're confident, you're kind of out there by yourself, right? In track and field, man, you better be confident. And I think it all showed up right there at the end, and we pulled it off.
[00:08:04] Speaker A: You coached them, but Chris Bucknham did a ton of work helping put together this team.
How much credit does he get for. For these championships that you guys win this year?
[00:08:14] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, he didn't. He didn't Leave us a bad program. I mean, he left us a great program. And, and that's all part of it and that's part of the tradition. And we just, we just really tried to continue on doing the things that we were doing before. That's kind of. And even when Coach Bucknam and I got here, when, when took over For John McDonnell, you know, we, we didn't come in here and think we had to change things that drastically. We just had to maintain it and, you know, nurture it a little bit and get it to mold around what we wanted it to be and how we wanted it to act. And that's kind of the same thing our staff did this year. We didn't really try and throw it out the window and start over. It was more, hey, we got a good thing here. Let's keep this thing rolling and do the best we can with it.
[00:08:56] Speaker A: And one of those, one of those McDonald legacies that you guys try to keep is having a really well balanced all around track program. And that's not necessarily the case everywhere. I mean, you know this. But for people who don't, I mean, you got a lot of schools that are, you know, what you guys refer to as distance factories where they're really good in cross country, they're really good and say like the 5k, the 10k, they're not fielding a whole lot of sprinters or jumpers. And then on the flip side, you got a lot of sprint factories, you got a lot of schools who are, you know, they're really heavy in the sprints and the hurdles. You guys still want to have that well balanced all around team where like you said, you're good in the 100, you're good in the 10k, but you're also good in the cross country and you're good in the indoor and you're good in the outdoor. And it feels like that is becoming harder and harder and harder for a program to maintain a high level of success.
When you try to recruit and have a program that looks like that, well,
[00:09:48] Speaker B: it's hard from many standpoints. First of all, you have to have a great staff to recruit those student athletes in so that you can have that diversity in your team and have the good sprinters and have the good distance runners and have the good jumpers.
And then now there's a limit on roster spots in the SEC and the ncaa. So now we're, you know, we're battling that. How many people can we have on our team? And we have, we currently have, you can have 35 on your roster. So, you know, you can't just go out and openly recruit like we used to. We used to just get after it and you know, try and have some walk on type kids that could come in and develop and be better.
You know, now with, you know, money crunches and roster crunches and all those things, you know, we're, we're fighting a different battle and we're having to, we're having to learn how to adapt to it and how. And our recruiting has to change a little bit and the way we coach has to change a little bit. So it's a different atmosphere now than it was and it really started last year. But this year I can really see the change in the way things have taken effect with the roster limits and things like that. It's going to be, the upcoming years are going to be different, I think for track and field for sure and probably for most Olympic sports I think. But you know, we're going to work through it and we, I think we did a great job this year and we're going to, we're going to keep working on it for next year.
[00:11:05] Speaker A: Is it just, is it just the roster limitation and I'm sure you're talking about the house settlement and how that's affected the sport, but is it just the roster limits or like what are the challenges that you face as a track coach putting together this 35 man roster every year?
[00:11:18] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, well, it's also financial, you know, it's scholarship money, it's the nils, all that stuff that affects all of our sports. It affects us the same way. So, you know, you know, we're battling teams that have 40% more scholarships than we do right now. And that's just the nature of the beast, you know, that's where we are and we're not laying down because of it. I'm just saying that that's, that's a fact. And you know, teams that have 35 scholarships and some teams have 45 scholarships, you know, the Big Ten, the SEC has limited us to 35, where the Big Ten and the Big 12 have 45. So, you know, we're fighting those guys too and you know, hopefully we can maintain our status and stay where we are. We just, we just have to do a better job of recruiting and a better job of coaching and I think we'll stay in it.
[00:12:04] Speaker A: The development aspect, does that help offset maybe the financial disparities that, you know, like whenever, if you're an athlete who you want to be great in the. Let's Just say the hundred and you see the 100 meter runners and sprinters that Arkansas has put out. Like, does that help? Like, maybe a guy is going to come here for X number of dollars or percent percentage of scholarship because he knows that he might get to the level of a Jordan Anthony or of a. I mean, Jelani Watkins. He looks like he's got a bright future. Does that help at all?
[00:12:34] Speaker B: Oh, for sure. You know, and Jordan just coming in and doing what he did last year, it really was a catalyst for our sprint program. And if you listen, you know, Jordan said it many times, I wanted to come in and make Arkansas sprint school. Well, I think he did it. You know, he was definitely a big factor in that getting started. And then, you know, Jelani's here and then we're recruiting a bunch of really good guys now. But, you know, that's honestly a big part of it. You have to have success. So other athletes see your success and then they want to be part of your program and they understand that. The athletes understand that if things are happening good at Arkansas for other athletes, it can happen good for them when they get there, too. So that's all part of the recruiting process. You know, we show those guys off as much as we can, and it's a great recruiting tool, for sure.
[00:13:21] Speaker A: You know, Chris Bucknham would always say if you guys get like second or third or fourth place, a podium finished without a title, he'd say, I want to go throw myself off a cliff. Because, I mean, he just hated it. And I know that affected you guys as assistant coaches when you were too, but, like, it just goes to show, like, what the expectations are at Arkansas. I mean, it's unfortunate, maybe it's fortunate, I don't know. But it's national championship or the season wasn't a total success.
You never felt, or it never felt to me like you were taken aback by that. Like, it felt to me like you really embraced that. Why?
[00:13:58] Speaker B: I think, you know, I've been here 18 years coaching here, and I just think that's just part of the. It's the nature of the beast. We knew what it was when we came here and took the job, and I knew what it was this year when I took the job.
It's part of it. We explained it to our athletes when we're recruiting them that, you know, things might be a little different at Arkansas. You know, we're expected to win. It's.
There's probably only two or three schools in the country who really feel like we do every year that we have to go out and win a national title or win an SEC title. And, you know, I think that when you live in it for a while, you kind of know what it feels like and you just have to embrace it and go with it. And that's what our team did, that's what our staff did this year. And we're going to continue to work in that direction.
[00:14:40] Speaker A: If you look forward to next year. I mean, you got a lot of these scores back. You told me in January you said, I think you said you had 14 athletes who had scored at an NCAA meet between athletes that you had coming back or that you had transferred in. And so you've got a lot of scorers potentially coming back next year.
You kind of have the same setup where you've got the indoor meet here in Fayetteville. And obviously nobody's ever going to take the outdoor meet away from Eugene. It doesn't feel like. But I mean, how does next year stack up for you as you're kind of putting this roster together?
[00:15:12] Speaker B: We're in really good shape. We look really good coming back. I think I counted. I haven't done the outdoor yet, but INDOORS we have 50 points returning from last year's team, and I think second place was 48 points last year, and we scored 70 some. We had a, you know, obviously a great meet, but we have a lot of great individuals returning already.
And when we add a couple guys to it here at the end recruiting, I think we're going to, you know, we're going to stack it up and be pretty good again.
[00:15:38] Speaker A: Cross country wise.
Wasn't a great year last year.
A little bit of an experience, it felt like with. With you guys on the cross country side. What's that look like? Because, I mean, that's coming up really fast. You're talking about the first cross country meets probably, what, two months away?
[00:15:52] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. I mean, I think I look at our roster right now, we're in. We're in really good shape in cross country. We'll try and add another distance runner here. There, you know, right in the end while we're recruiting. It's portal recruiting season right now, basically. You know, the high school season is kind of over. But yeah, we'll try and add some guys when they. If and when they get on the portal. We'll see how that turns out. But we could definitely use another distance runner. And actually right now, Kale's over in Kenya right now.
He didn't even get to come home from the meeting. We sent him Right over. So, yeah, I think we're going to be in good shape.
[00:16:29] Speaker A: How much workout does your passport get? Because, I mean, you guys go out. Kenyons is where you want to recruit the distance runners from. You guys do a very good job of recruiting Jamaica.
How much international travel is involved in what you're doing?
[00:16:42] Speaker B: You know, we have coaches go to Europe and like we said, go to Africa and go to the Islands and stuff all the time.
It's gotten where we're so well known. I would say that we get a lot of attention from other countries and we don't necessarily have to travel there. As much as they recognize we're a great program and they want to be involved with it and they give us a call and we, you know, you can do a lot of stuff on Zoom and stuff now. So many communications are like that. That we do. But yeah, we're strong in international recruiting.
If you look at the NCAA results and you're not doing that, you're going to be in trouble. You just have to go find some of those international recruits to come in and, you know, round out your program.
[00:17:24] Speaker A: That Razorback logo that, like, that's a. There's not a language barrier when it comes to that, right?
[00:17:28] Speaker B: That thing is well known. Let me tell you, any country you go to, they know exactly what that is. They really do.
[00:17:33] Speaker A: So you brought in Kel Wallace, who ran here at Arkansas to be your, your distance coach.
This is a little bit different because John McDonnell and Chris Bucknham, they both were distance coaches by nature. That's not what you. That's not what you are. And so how does cross country work now? Because it is different than it's been here at Arkansas in a lot of years. Because you're still overseeing the program, but you kind of have someone else running the day to day practice, right?
[00:17:59] Speaker B: Yeah. Cale's the cross country coach and he'll do all the workout plan, all the workouts do. But when we recruit, I should say this, we recruit as a staff. We really do. We'll have a recruit in and we'll have our entire staff meet with the recruit, no matter what event it is.
But he'll primarily be in charge of the recruiting for that, and he'll be the guy that kind of makes the decisions on which athletes he wants and which athletes he thinks can come in and compete at our level and things like that. So a lot of conversations about recruiting, you know, we sit in the office all the time, just in a group, and you're always talking about that.
What we need what our outlook is and we're always trying to fill gaps and fill holes with certain athletes. But, you know, Cale's done so far just a great job of adding to our program and I think that he can help raise the level even more.
[00:18:54] Speaker A: Any irony you see, you and Chris Johnson, both as first year head coaches at Arkansas, won indoor and outdoor national championships. That's, that's, it's, it's kind of hard to believe, to be honest with you.
[00:19:04] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's, I guess that's tradition too now, you know, and I even, even Hunter Jurczyk asked me before, is it harder to maintain it or is it harder to win the first one? I, I don't even know. Yeah, I really believe that, you know, things kind of come together at some aspect through your career and you have that great moment where, you know, everything turned out and that, that's already happened to us. But, you know, I just, I think everything we have in place, including the staff and the, and the current athletes, we have that, you know, we're going to keep, we're going to keep accelerating. We're going to be a better team even than we were this year.
[00:19:40] Speaker A: You guys do this flag raising ceremony after you win national championships. If you've ever been by the outdoor track, you'll see the flag with a number on it, the numbers changing, and that's combined national championships. You're going to raise a number 53 flag. I think you guys could put 55, but that's a different story for a different day.
The.
When does that happen and why is that? Why has that become such a big deal? Because it does feel like it's kind of a, it's a big deal when you guys are able to change that number.
[00:20:10] Speaker B: Well, we do it a lot, you know, and we order those flags in twos, so.
[00:20:14] Speaker A: So you already had 53. We had 53 like in place.
[00:20:19] Speaker B: Yeah, we actually, we actually ordered it and had it here. So, yeah, it's just, it's a cool ceremony if you've ever been to it and been down there.
But it's pretty neat to hoist that flag. And it's something that nobody else has ever done. I mean, 53 national team titles in one sport at one university is, it's incredible. I don't know if that can ever be duplicated. And, you know, obviously the women have contributed to that as well. And I think they got pretty close to. I think they were third at the meet and had a really good meet and a good finish. And it speaks to just everything at Arkansas. I think everything in track and field at Arkansas, from our facilities to our coaching, to just the way we train, the way we travel, the way we participate, the way we compete.
You know, it's an overall statement of this is a great place to.
To run track and be a track athlete.
[00:21:15] Speaker A: So do we know when 53 is going to get raised yet?
[00:21:17] Speaker B: I'm hearing that maybe Thursday afternoon.
[00:21:20] Speaker A: Is that something the public is invited to?
[00:21:22] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[00:21:22] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:21:22] Speaker B: Yeah, it'll be down at John McDonald track down there.
And we don't know what time yet, but I believe it's going to be in the afternoon on Thursday.
[00:21:29] Speaker A: All right, well, we'll make sure to be there. Doug. Hey, congratulations on all your success. It's been a lot of fun to watch this year.
[00:21:34] Speaker B: Thank you. It's been a great season. Go Hogs.
[00:21:36] Speaker A: When we come back, Christina Long's going to be here in studio with me. We'll be back in just a moment.
And we're back. Christina Long is in here in studio with me. That's like a pit change. Doug out of here. Got Christina in here.
You cover track. I mean, it's been a lot of fun to watch them this year.
[00:21:50] Speaker C: Yeah, it's been a ton of fun. I've really enjoyed covering track the last couple years. I feel like you and I get to kind of nerd out about track sometimes. I've learned a lot about it from you. It was. It's a fun sport because I feel like since it was new to me, when I started writing about it, I.
I learned something new. I feel like every time I'm out there and with Arkansas this year, with the men specifically, it was just, you know, and I wrote about this after the championship was. It was. It was not a surprise to see them doing what they did, but at the same time, it never stopped being interesting.
You know, you. You knew, especially after they really. They ran away with the indoor title, like, they scored, I think, 35 or 33 points more than second place.
[00:22:27] Speaker A: Yeah, it was significant.
[00:22:28] Speaker C: It was crazy.
And so you kind of knew going into outdoor, they were even going to get some guys back that didn't have indoor eligibility, that had outdoor eligibility, that were going to be helpful to them.
So you knew they were going to take another step forward.
And so even though it was expected, it never got old.
[00:22:46] Speaker A: And that's the thing. It's like every year, you know, they win an SEC championship. Arkansas just won its 125th conference or whatever.
It literally may be shortchange at this point in time, I mean, they won 84 conference championships in the Southwest Conference, and, I mean, we know they've dominated the sec, but it never gets old.
It's interesting how winning, just like you can never win enough, you always want to keep winning.
[00:23:13] Speaker C: Yeah, totally. And I think that's what's been interesting about the. The changeover from legendary coaches for both the men's and women's programs. Now is the talk has all, you know, they've. They've promoted from within. And the talk has always been about, you know, we're not changing anything. I'm not changing the identity of this team. I think some things have changed a little bit on the women's side, but I don't think it was necessarily intended to be, you know, I don't think it's because they want to, you know, break with tradition or anything like that. The. The idea has been how can we continue to achieve at the level we've been. Achie. And it's always about winning. And, you know, Doug told me the other day, you know, and I'm sure he talked about this earlier about, you know, we expect to win. We expect to be among the best every single year, and the people we are trying to bring in here, like, that's. Those kinds of people, like.
[00:23:56] Speaker A: Well, and I didn't. I didn't want to get too in the weeds with him about this, but, you know, he touched on.
There's a financial component to this where they're. They're kind of playing with one hand behind their back a little bit, you know, because everybody's got to determine how much money are we going to put into this sport? How much money are we going to put into that sport? And, you know, you've done the reporting on the UA board of trustees getting this.
What would you call back?
[00:24:24] Speaker C: A presentation. Presentation. They heard some talking.
[00:24:27] Speaker A: Yeah.
So this company, third party company, puts together a report, and it basically says that they are overspending on track and field by a significant number, probably seven figures relative to what other, you know, track and field programs are spending. But I don't know that you can put a dollar amount on the goodwill that comes from, number one, winning titles.
Because I think, you know, there are a lot of people who.
They don't care about track and field. If razorback football doesn't win, they're not happy. And I can't imagine being like that where 12 Saturdays a year affect your happiness as a sport fan. But there are a lot of people who. They like the success of Track, they like the success of soccer, of softball, getting to the World Series, and so on and so forth. And so it's a really. It's a really tough time, I think, because I understand you got to spin for football to keep up with the teams that are spinning in football, but you don't want to see these great stories like Arkansas track and field, like North Carolina soccer, whatever the sport might be, whatever the, you know, the dynasty might be. You don't want to see that go away. Or at least I don't think you want to. I don't want to see it go away.
[00:25:44] Speaker C: Yeah. I found it to be really unfortunate and really kind of disheartening for somebody who just likes college sports and who followed, you know, who has followed a college where there's not pro sports in your state, you know, where this is what you have to see, this kind of almost conflict arise between sports at
[00:26:02] Speaker A: the same school if they're in competition with each other.
[00:26:05] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:26:06] Speaker A: And I hate that you are in as much competition if you're not a football or a men's basketball coach. I think you are in as much competition with other sports at your school than you are the teams that you're trying to be on the field. You know, like, if you're, let's say, Razorback baseball, you are in as much competition to try to get the funds and the resources that you need to be successful inside your own university as you are trying to compete with Ole Miss baseball or LSU baseball or A and M baseball or whoever else out on the recruiting trail or on the field on the weekend. And that is crazy to me. That's been the biggest change, I think, that you see in all of this.
[00:26:45] Speaker C: And I think it's always been there to an extent. I mean, coaches have always had to go to bat for their programs, with their administrators, to try to get more for facilities, more for their staff, more for whatever.
I think now it's just playing out a lot more publicly, and we hear about it a lot more and we see it a lot more, and it's spilled over into the kind of, like, public discourse among fans where, you know, if you are somebody who cares about softball, you are somebody who's holding back the football program, and you should, you know, like, there's this sort of shaming about being a fan of the same team. That happens sometimes, and I think that's really weird. But, I mean, I'm biased because I'm somebody that cares about sports like track and softball and whatever. But, like, I think that's weird. And it makes me. It's one of the things that I think maybe people don't talk about as much as a side effect of this kind of era. And one of the things that is making it harder to be a college sports fan is it's. I find it like really disheartening and actively frustrating.
[00:27:36] Speaker A: Well, let's try to pick up a little bit here.
We're going to just kind of talk about what's going on. Since we're a weekly podcast during the summertime, we're daily for about nine or 10 months out of the year. We're weekly during the summer. Just what's gone on in the last week here in Fayetteville. Obviously track and field winning the national championship was the big story of the week. But baseball has been very active in the transfer portal here over the last week. We've started to have a lot more commitments that have trickled out. You know, people, whether it be, you know, they've announced publicly, they've leaked, they've
[00:28:10] Speaker C: changed their Instagram bio.
[00:28:12] Speaker A: Let's not get there.
It is. It's kind of maddening covering portal recruiting, to be honest with you.
And like just, I mean, we'll just do what Christina's talking about. Like, just because someone changes their Instagram bio is not enough for. In my opinion.
[00:28:32] Speaker C: Yeah, I think it is like a
[00:28:33] Speaker A: reporter to say, I kind of think it is committed. What if they just want to screw with you? You know, I mean, I guess that's true. I'm gonna put it on, but I
[00:28:40] Speaker C: feel like they wouldn't do that if they were gonna go somewhere else. I think that makes sense.
[00:28:45] Speaker A: This happened a few years ago. I'm just going to post a picture of a Razorback on Instagram.
So that means what does it mean? Yeah, I mean, you know, that can mean.
That can mean any number of things. Yeah, it gets hard when you're trying to report on this and making sure that it's accurate. But these are the commits that Arkansas has gotten so far. When Bubba and I were in here last week, we talked about a few pitchers they've gotten. That was Ridge Harvey, a left hander from Belmont. Micah Henson, a left hander from Crowder who began his career at Kansas State. And Lance Alexander, a right hander from Johnson County Community College. He started and won the NJCAA national championship game at the JUCO World Series up in Grand Junction. Since then, Arkansas has added commitments from Dawson Bryce, he is a third baseman from Charlotte. Had a really good freshman year. He was like a 340 hitter, I think as a freshman.
Struggled with some injuries this year, didn't have as good of a year. Zeb Allen is an outfielder from UCA. He is UCA's career home run leader.
I think that that's, that's an interesting pickup to me. I don't know that it's quite.
I don't know, it's Charles Davilin, but I think you could maybe make some comparisons there and kind of how they're built. Obviously they're both outfielders. There's a little bit of power there.
Again, Charles Davilon was a first round draft pick. That's a high bar to try to compare him to, but I don't know. I see a little bit of a comparison.
[00:30:15] Speaker C: Is there any kind of a comp with. I know obviously if he's built like Charles Avalon, he's not built like Zach Stewart, but is there any kind of a Zach Stewart comp? Because Zach Stewart was such a powerful hitter at Missouri State and now you're sort of translating, you know, a guy that.
[00:30:25] Speaker A: So the thing is like zeb Allen hit 30 home runs at UCA. Stewart had 44 coming in. So it's, it's different. Yeah, I think it's a little bit different. Braden Krenzel is a right hander from Tennessee who committed.
You might recognize the last name. Craig Krenzel is his dad. Craig Krenzel was the quarterback, starting quarterback for Ohio State's 2002 national championship team. Braden, he had a pretty good freshman year. Sophomore year didn't go well. Of course, you know, Tony Bottello leaves, Frank Anderson leaves Tennessee.
Their pitching was not good at Tennessee this year. I think it was their highest ERA they've had in 13 years. They fired their first year pitching coach after the season, went and got a new guy. I think that's kind of telling.
Krenzel, I believe he missed at least a couple of series with some sort of injury or illness or something. So there was something going on and his numbers weren't real good. But what I tell people all the time is that if you're a coach, especially with pitchers, you are evaluating arm talent. You're not evaluating stats. Because if you're evaluating stats, you never go get Ethan McIlvaine.
Well, you know, he came in like he came in and did pretty good. How about Joey Volchko at Georgia? Arkansas wanted him very famously last year. LSU wanted him. So you're talking about Matt Hobbs and Wes Johnson and Nate Yeske. These are three of the very best pitching Coaches in the country, they all wanted to work with this guy because you can't teach a guy how to throw 98, 99 miles an hour.
And obviously, you know, he came in and he's done well for Georgia, had a great start the other night at the College World Series. So I think Krenzel kind of fits in that mold of someone who you get them because the arm talent's there and you bring them in and you see how you can develop them.
Moving on. Arkansas has gotten a few more commits just in the last 24 hours. Wills McGinnis is a third baseman. He can play some other positions in the infield too, but from Georgia State. His younger brother is Hayes McGinnis who's a two way player committed to the Razorbacks and in the rising high school senior class. So he'll be a high school class of 20, 27. Maybe they are able to play together at Arkansas. Kind of an interesting side note there.
Wills McGinnis, who just transferred in here, he played with his older brother Michael at Georgia State and then Michael transferred out and he's at North Carolina on their run through Omaha right now.
[00:32:46] Speaker C: So college baseball family?
[00:32:48] Speaker A: Yes, very much so. Very much a baseball family. And then Arkos has gotten a couple of commits today. AJ I hope I'm saying his name right. Ibasco, he is an infielder outfielder at Kansas State. Big time power with this guy. I mean he had this year, I'd say big time power. He's got 19 career home runs, 103 RBI, a lot of extra base hits in his career. Including this year he had four triples at K State. So you know, he's a big, big bat, 6 foot 6, 220 pounds. He's from Lincoln, Nebraska. And then they got a commitment today who I honestly, this just happened before we started.
[00:33:26] Speaker C: I was gonna say I saw somebody else. I can't remember the name but I had just seen it.
[00:33:29] Speaker A: Luke Niswonger I believe is how you say his last name. And he's a right handed pitcher from Central Michigan and haven't gotten a chance to look too much into him. But that's another commitment that Arkansas's got. And so there's their transfer class is filling up. There's a catcher from TCU named Nolan Traeger who a lot of people think is on the verge of committing to Arkansas. In fact, his summer league team last night, the Chatham Anglers on the Cape Cod League, they actually inadvertently, they tweeted something with his name and said that he played for Razorback Baseball. They went back and changed it. But, you know, there's been a lot of chatter that he's very heavily involved in Arkansas, and so maybe that happens here pretty soon. That's another name to watch. They obviously need to go out and get a catcher for this class, but so that's kind of where baseball portal recruiting is. I mean, some of these guys, like, I think Allen is one of the higher rated recruits in terms of the sites that put together these portal rankings. I think Vasco was the same way for Kansas State.
I don't know that that matters because I think what Arkansas has done a good job of is going and finding players who they see a high ceiling with, like, more potential than they've shown or like there's more in the tank than maybe what they've shown at their previous school. And I can go through the list. I mean, think about Zach Root at East Carolina versus what he did at Arkansas. Think about Cam Kozal, Vanderbilt to Arkansas, Ethan McIlvain, Vanderbilt to Arkansas.
Going back. Jared Wagner from Creighton to Arkansas took a big jump that same year. Tavian Josenberger took a big jump from Kansas to Arkansas. And you could go on and on. Davilon Vijiva Aloy to a lesser extent, Kahi Olloy. So there's.
There's just a number of these guys where I feel like they, it's. They don't bat a thousand, but they do a really good job, I think, of evaluating players and saying that, you know what, you come in here, let us work with you for six months, eight months, whatever the case might be, and we think we can bring something else out of you. And I think that's kind of what this class looks like to me. If you're waiting for Arkansas to be the team that spends the biggest paycheck on baseball portal recruiting, I think you'll be waiting a long time. I just think that there are a lot of other teams that are out there that can outspend Arkansas. But what I think Arkansas has the ability to do is pay players a nice amount of money, like develop them and then, you know, win with them at a pretty high level. And I think that's got to be attractive to some players. It's not going to be attractive to everybody. You know, the guys that want to have 17 chains on while they blow kisses around the bases after hitting home,
[00:36:17] Speaker C: they got a couple of those guys
[00:36:19] Speaker A: not quite like some other teams that I'm thinking about, but, you know, it's.
There's a certain type of baseball player that I think Arkansas appeals to, and I still think that there's an ability to win at a high level with that type of player.
[00:36:31] Speaker C: Yeah, no, I think so too. And I wanted to ask you when you. Because I don't remember, you know, last year's kind of portal cycle that well, in terms of who was hyped and who was guys that, you know, fell into that category. We were just talking about who were maybe, you know, diamonds in the rough or guys that had stepped back and needed to kind of get brought back up, like McIlvaine. But I can't remember some of the other guys, you know, who were the most. I mean, Micah New came in with a lot of hype, so he's an example.
[00:36:57] Speaker A: He was playing really kind of the opposite of the season and he had done well in Cape Cod.
[00:37:00] Speaker C: Right. So that was kind of an example of the opposite. But I. I feel like. Was the. Was the consternation this season about the additions they had, was it that they didn't get the splashy name, that they didn't spend the most or. Because to me, you know, are we going to see them do that this year? Maybe not. Is that going to be a problem? I don't know.
[00:37:18] Speaker A: I feel like this group, they've got. Right.
And again, they've got more. They're going to have more portal players this year. They're going to have more transfers. Just because there's. From 25 to 26, there was a lot of returning players.
There are going to be returning players, but I don't think it's going to be quite the level, and certainly not the level of high production that those guys have shown previously.
It feels like it's a stronger portal class to me. I don't know that there's that splashy player in this class, and I don't
[00:37:48] Speaker C: know that there has to be. But I do think that's one thing that people, if, you know, if things don't go great next season or if they go similar to how they did this year, you know, early on, are people gonna, you know, point to that again and go, well, they didn't. If they had just gotten this big star, if they had just done this thing, and maybe that is the answer, maybe it's not. But I kind of wonder. I think that was kind of the.
[00:38:06] Speaker A: I think some of it depends too, on who were the other players they were targeting.
[00:38:09] Speaker C: Right.
[00:38:10] Speaker A: And how do they do right. In their new opportunities? Like Volchko, you know, I mean, he
[00:38:16] Speaker C: had kind of a down stretch Right.
[00:38:17] Speaker A: Volchko would have been great to have on your pitching staff.
I don't doubt that at all. But he didn't. He wasn't great during the regular season either. Like. Like, and this is. This is a straw man argument, but, like, would you rather have Hunter Dietz and what he gave you as a number one pitcher, or would you rather have Joey Volchko and what he gave you as number one pitcher? Well, the correct answer there is you'd rather have one going on Friday and one going on Saturday. But, you know, it's. Volt. School was great the other day in Omaha, but he's been very inconsistent this year.
Yeah, I don't know. It's.
It's the Portal.
People have their.
And I'm talking about fans. They got their guys. It's like, man, I can just see that guy. Razorback uniform or I can see and doesn't always work out.
[00:39:00] Speaker C: Yeah, the staff has their guys, too.
[00:39:02] Speaker A: Yeah, they do.
[00:39:02] Speaker C: Sometimes they're the same, sometimes they're not.
[00:39:04] Speaker A: Well, I think that, you know, I think that, you know, there probably have been. In fact, I think there are. There are players who come in and from a. If you're just looking at a stat sheet, you would say, you want that guy.
[00:39:19] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:39:20] Speaker A: And you spend about 20 minutes around them and it's like, that's not going to fit our. And I think, Dave, our club wants
[00:39:24] Speaker C: a very particular kind of player. I mean, there's a reason you don't often see those.
[00:39:28] Speaker A: I think one of the reasons Arkansas has been really good in this Portal era, you know, because there have been a lot of teams that have been really good for most years, but then they'll have a year where they're just really down. Kind of like what LSU was this year.
I feel like more often than not you see that. Than a team like Arkansas that's just kind of been consistently steady. And I know this year dipped a little bit from what their previous years were, but they're still right there the day before Memorial Day being talked about as a team that probably should host a regional.
There's a level of consistency, and I think a big part of that has been finding players who fit your clubhouse. Well. I'm not going to say culture, but finding guys who are not going to come in and be a clubhouse problem. And I think they've done a really good job with that.
[00:40:13] Speaker C: Yeah. I mean, I can't think of a whole lot of guys that have had that air to them in recent years.
[00:40:19] Speaker A: I don't think so. I Think they've done a good job of bringing in good teammates, guys that people like to be around and, you know, not just on the field, but you want to go out, you want to go fish with them, you want to go out, and you want to play paintball with them, you want to go out, you want to hunt with them. You know, I'm saying, like.
[00:40:36] Speaker C: And stuff like that sounds corny, but I actually do think it matters, especially in baseball.
[00:40:39] Speaker A: Great bit. You know, it's. Somebody told me one time they said so much about winning and losing in baseball, and you can apply this to every sport, is about how the guys feel about each other in that locker room, because if it's just based on talent, the New York Yankees and the Dodgers win the World Series every year. And I know Los Angeles won the last year, but you know what I'm saying, Like, even the Dodgers. My son and I actually were having a conversation about this a couple of weeks ago. It's like, I think one of the things the Dodgers have done well is, yes, they've gone out and they've gotten all the big name players, but I think they've gotten guys who fit into the framework of what that organization wants to look like. And when you can do that, that's when you're going to have a ton of success. I think LSU's had that a couple of.
I think LSU especially had that in 2025. It felt like that group really liked playing with each other, and then you had a ton of talent on that team.
But I think, you know, it's so much about winning and losing, is so much about how they feel about each other, that that plays a huge role in who wins and loses games. I think it does. And I think, again, we're talking about baseball. That applies to football, that applies to basketball, because if you don't like each other, you're not going to play hard for each other whenever the going gets hard.
[00:41:51] Speaker C: I mean, even track, which is a very individual sport with team. Doug told me the other day when we talked after the championship, that he felt like this was a really special group where they just. They had fun in practice. They were enjoying being and training together. And, you know, even a sport like that where it's, yeah, you get points, you get team points, but it is a pretty individual sport. Stuff like that still matters.
[00:42:11] Speaker A: Let's see, moving on. Colby Hale has a new contract as Arkansas soccer coach. Of course, he's the winningest coach in Razorback soccer history by a long shot. Like, if he stays here Long enough, Christina, we're going to be looking at a deal where he's got three or four times as many wins as like the next closest person.
You go back and you think about Razorback soccer before Colby Hale, there's a chance you didn't even know it existed because they just weren't very good. And he's done an absolutely wonderful job at Arkansas. He's won five SEC championships, I think in the last seven years.
So he's been extended through December 31 of 20.
His contract was set to expire at the end of this year. They've been working for a while to get a new contract in place for him.
I'd heard that this was coming for probably six months or more now, but they've got that in place and so we don't know the financial details. I think when you look though, through what he was making last year and there's some different databases that are out there on what college soccer coaches make, you're looking at probably a top 10 to 15 page coach in the country, which, you know, based on the results that they have, I mean they're. They've been in the final eight a few times. They've. It seems like they're a lot of times they're in that round of 16 that's. You're getting what you pay for.
[00:43:23] Speaker C: Yeah, it feels on par with how they usually finish and what their results are. But yeah, he's been raised by soccer under him, has been. Has been fun. And I think especially these last few years, it feels like they've really kind of rounded into. Into form these last couple of years. And yeah, he's been SEC Coach of the Year four times, 11 NCAA tournament appearances, all of Arkansas's NCAA tournament appearances under him. So yeah, it was good to see
[00:43:45] Speaker A: he's won 183 games. I guess he's got a chance this year to maybe get to 200. Yeah, and I don't. I think he had the school record before he got to 100. Yeah, he might have in terms of wins.
[00:43:55] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:43:55] Speaker A: And they've got a really good.
I told you this morning, I think that one of the reasons they wanted this finished and out this summer is to promote the schedule that they have. I mean, like they got North Carolina coming in. That's a big draw.
You know, they've got talk about Clemson, Clemson's coming in. Baylor, I think is who they start the season with. So that like their non conference schedule is really good. And all of those games, by the way, are before football season. Starts. So like there will be a little bit more of a spotlight I think put on them because football won't have started yet. But then they've, you know, I think they've got a pretty good SEC schedule this year in Fayetteville too. So. Colby Hale has been extended as Arkansas soccer coach. Let's see what else we got going on. Oh, softball. They hired a new assistant coach. They got Boise State's head coach away to come coach for Courtney Diefel.
[00:44:43] Speaker C: Yeah, I think anytime you hire a sitting head coach away, you know, to, to the SEC is, is interesting and notable. I think, you know, I think everybody was sad to see DJ Gasso go excited, you know, for him to. I know the program was and Courtney was happy for him to get a head coaching job, but I think, you know, he's just become so synonymous with the, the high powered offenses that they' last few years and just has become, you know, kind of a secondary face of, of the program. You know, he'll do media sometimes. He'll do, you know, he, he became an additional spokesperson for them and I
[00:45:12] Speaker A: think representative came on this podcast before they started the post.
[00:45:15] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, it was great.
And so, you know, I think everybody was, was sad to see him go and was curious how that would affect them, how it would affect their recruiting, how it would affect, you know, their retention. And it seems like everything's been fine in that sense. And then, you know, they go out and get somebody who's been a, a sitting head coach, which I think is always notable when you can pull that off.
[00:45:34] Speaker A: So by the way, this is Justin Schultz, who's Arkansas's new associate head coach. He's 38 years old. He was 167 and 102 at Boise State and his winning percentage is the best in Boise State history. So he's going to help Arkansas softball from a portal perspective. They're about two or three weeks behind baseball. I've never understood why it is that every other sport other than baseball gets to conduct their portal business outside of the season. But yet you have all these coaches that are in Omaha right now and the portal has been open for two weeks, two and a half weeks, calendar issue.
[00:46:10] Speaker C: Like if you don't have enough time to get them here. And I know people don't care, but like the, like it does actually like for administrative purposes matter.
[00:46:17] Speaker A: But I mean, if softball can do it in the month of July, why can baseball not do it in the month of July?
[00:46:21] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:46:21] Speaker A: Yeah, that doesn't make any sense to me.
[00:46:23] Speaker C: I guess Maybe it's when you start. I don't know.
[00:46:25] Speaker A: Well, softball ends before baseball ends by about a month. Yeah, it's very strange. It's very strange that baseball has to work within those confines.
And, you know, I mean, it's. I was talking to Matt Hobbs the other day, by the way, Matt Hobbs is going to coach Team USA this summer. He's going to be an assistant coach. He's going to be their pitching coach on a trip that they take to Taiwan.
And, you know, we were talking about Portal recruiting and he said, you know, when we were in Omaha last year, he said I was literally 15 minutes away from getting on the bus to go coach a game at the College World Series. And I'm doing zoom calls with recruits from like the team meeting room in the hotel. It's insane what these coaches are doing up there. And I think that it's got to be a little bit of a distraction for the coaches. You know, not that they're trying to be distracted, but I think it's got to be a distraction for them at the World Series. But certainly I think that you're seeing too, Christina, the results the next year from the teams that were in the World Series.
It just looks like they're not able to put all of the focus that they need to into in portal recruiting. I'll give you an example.
The third. No, the shortstop, I think at North Carolina, I was actually, because I'm a dork and I like to listen to play by play.
I was on a walk the other night and I was listening to North Carolinas play by play of their gaming at Ole Miss and they were talking about this guy.
He was at North Dakota State and then he got in the portal last year and he was down to three schools. Those three schools were North Carolina, Arkansas and Coastal Carolina.
He picked North Carolina. What was Arkansas and Coastal Carolina doing? They were playing almost to the very end in Omaha. Coastal obviously played till the end. Arkansas was one of the last three teams standing.
I don't know if that's why he went to North Carolina, but I got a pretty good.
[00:48:19] Speaker C: They probably gave him a little bit more attention.
[00:48:21] Speaker A: What it does is North Carolina. They're out of it. Hey, you can come look at our campus. You can come look at our facilities. If you're in Omaha, you can't do that. You know, I mean, you can't do that until a certain point. And I think that affects those teams that are in Omaha from a recruiting standpoint.
[00:48:37] Speaker C: Yeah. Yeah. It's been interesting now that this has been, you know, going on long enough to kind of start. You can start to see a trend emerge when you get a few years in, you see it continue to be happening. And. And you keep getting examples of that, of teams taking a step back after they've been in the College World Series. It's interesting to track this trend.
[00:48:53] Speaker A: Last year was the first time that there had not been back to back visitors to Omaha since 1957.
[00:49:00] Speaker C: Crazy.
[00:49:00] Speaker A: Now it's happened two years in a row.
[00:49:02] Speaker C: Yeah.
Will it be three?
[00:49:04] Speaker A: And then, you know, you even go back a year further in. North Carolina is the only team that's been there twice in the last three years. So there have been 24 College World Series places up for grab in the last three years. 23 different schools have. Have grabbed those 24 spots. It's. It's.
[00:49:22] Speaker C: Which I like. You know, I like that. You know, I like that it's an opportunity. You know, when we look at things like the College Football Playoff and worrying about every, you know, the field being the same or whatever. Whatever and the access to it and stuff. And I like that you get a little bit of change. But obviously for. For some programs, you. I think 23 out of 24 is a lot.
[00:49:40] Speaker A: At the same time, I think you kind of like seeing you. You kind of like seeing familiarity.
[00:49:45] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:49:46] Speaker A: At the World Series.
[00:49:46] Speaker C: Yeah. You need the balance of both.
[00:49:48] Speaker A: You need. You need the team, you need the villain.
[00:49:50] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:49:50] Speaker A: You know what I mean?
[00:49:51] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:49:51] Speaker A: You need that team that. You need the villain or you need the villain.
[00:49:53] Speaker C: You need Murray State and you need lsu.
[00:49:55] Speaker A: Yeah, I think so. I guess they had that a little bit this year with different teams.
We know that the women's basketball schedule, SEC games came out today. We've got that on our
[email protected] typically, the way the SEC does this is that if they announce something for women's basketball on one day, men's basketball announcement is inevitably coming the next day. So we'll see. Maybe we'll get Arkansas's SEC opponents for basketball one day this week.
It's summertime, but it's kind of surprisingly busy. I know right now I'm always a little hesitant when baseball gets eliminated as early as they did this year. That June might end up being kind of quiet.
Haven't been quiet. It feels like there's been a lot going on.
[00:50:42] Speaker C: Yeah, there definitely has. It's been a pleasant surprise. It's enough that I feel like we're getting a little bit of a break, but also we're not worried about trying to come up with something to do every day.
[00:50:51] Speaker A: No, that's always a good time.
[00:50:53] Speaker C: July, good stuff. Early July, we talked about it. That week of 4th of July is really tough.
[00:50:58] Speaker A: Yeah, that's kind of the peak of nothing going on. Like, you know, like outdoor championships or College World Series. Those are the last events that we'll cover.
And then things kind of start picking back up again once SEC football media days. That's usually mid.
It's usually like mid July to July 20, somewhere in that range. Of course. MLB draft is coming up. If you go to our website, got some news there on MLP Drafts and players, AR players and signees who are going to the MLB Draft combine next week in Phoenix. One other thing that we're going to be watching next week is it looks like that's when we're going to get the NCAA cabinet voting on the 5 and 5 legislation. So that's coming down the pike here. In the next would say eight or nine days we'll probably have it could get tabled, but we'll probably have a resolution here to whether the NCAA gives players a fifth year of eligibility, which it feels like the momentum is there for that.
[00:52:00] Speaker C: Yeah, it sounds like that's going to be something that passes, but I'll be interested to see kind of the results of that. And you know how that changes things. We've talked about how that affects baseball and things like that specifically.
[00:52:09] Speaker A: It changes every sport, but it really changes.
It can have a potentially a big change on baseball draft because if you're a player who maybe you just go to the MLB draft this year and you get drafted just to get the money because you can get 150,000 this year, but they're going to stick it to you for 10 next year. You go ahead and you do that now, you come back and you got an extra year of eligibility and that's a potential game changer. Of course, you know, MLB's in its last year of its collective bargaining agreement. There's potentially some big changes that are coming to the draft. This will be the last year I think we see the draft look like it looks right now in multiple ways.
There's some talks that there could be some drastic changes for the Major League Baseball draft in the future. Well, we appreciate you being with us today. We're going to be covering it all at our website, wholehogsports.com Again, if you would subscribe to our podcast, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, you can just follow our social media channels, Facebook and Twitter. You can find it there. We're a weekly podcast during the summer. Will be daily again closer to football season and once things really start to pick back up here on campus. Hope you have a great week, everybody. We'll see you next week.
