Long sets target date on Little Rock games

LITTLE ROCK (AP) — Arkansas athletic director Jeff Long says he wants to know within three to five months whether the Razorbacks will play football at Little Rock's War Memorial Stadium after 2018.

The University of Arkansas is currently obligated to play one more game at the 54,120seat stadium about 180 miles from its Fayetteville campus — a Southeastern Conference contest next season. An Aug. 31 game against Florida A&M drew 36,055 — the smallest crowd for an Arkansas game at Little Rock in 21 years.

Long told the Little Rock Touchdown Club on Monday that future opponents need to know which games could be played at Little Rock and which would be played at Fayetteville, which has a 72,000-seat stadium being expanded to accommodate 4,800 more. The university's trustees will consider where the Razorbacks will play.

Arkansas has played at least one game a year at Little Rock since 1932 and for more than five decades split games between central Arkansas and Fayetteville.

In 2000, the school's trustees voted to shift most games to the school's Fayetteville campus, gutting a planned expansion at War Memorial Stadium.

A debate over the future of the Little Rock games has raged ever since.

Long said Monday he was hopeful that the dispute wouldn't chase Arkansas fans to other teams.

"We are a small state. We're proud of that. We wear that on our shoulder and we compete knowing that we're a little bit of an underdog," Long said. "We need everyone pulling together, and I mean that sincerely. We will not be able to be successful at a high level unless we have everyone across the state pulling for us."

Under terms of its current contract with War Memorial Stadium, Arkansas would play Alabama, LSU, Ole Miss or Vanderbilt in Little Rock next season.