Arkansas dismisses Morris after 4-18 mark
Arkansas fired coach Chad Morris on Sunday after 22 games and no Southeastern Conference victories over nearly two terrible seasons.
Morris finished 4-18 and 0-14 in the SEC. Arkansas made the move less than 24 hours after the Razorbacks lost 45-19 at home to a Western Kentucky team quarterbacked by former Razorback Ty Storey. Morris’ only victories came against Eastern Illinois, Portland State — two FCS teams — Tulsa and Colorado State.
“As part of my continued evaluation, I have come to the conclusion that a change in leadership is necessary to move our football program forward and position it for success,” athletic director Hunter Yurachek said in a statement. “It is clear that we have not made the progress necessary to compete and win, especially within the Southeastern Conference.”
Morris is the second Power Five coach to be fired after less than two seasons on the job in eight days. Florida State fired Willie Taggart after 21 games last Sunday.
A year after a $160 million stadium renovation and expansion, Arkansas had its two lowest-attended games since a previous expansion in 2001.
Morris said Saturday that he still felt he was the man for the job, but he offered an honest assessment of where the program stood.
“It’s going to take some time,” Morris said. “This is not an overnight fix, and we’ve seen that now for two years. We’re all frustrated. We’re all incredibly frustrated. We have a big youth movement on this team and a lot of young guys that are contributing and are going to be tremendous football players. But where we are right now with these guys, we’ve got some major deficiencies that we have to fix.”
Morris was hired from SMU in December 2017 after Arkansas fired Bret Bielema. SMU went 14-22 in Morris’ three seasons in Dallas, though the Mustangs improved each year, capping at 7-5 in 2017. Before that, Morris was offensive coordinator at Clemson.
Morris, a Texas native, was a successful high school coach for years before becoming offensive coordinator at Tulsa. After one year, he was hired away by Clemson, where he coached and recruited Deshaun Watson.
Arkansas owes Morris just over $10 million in buying out his contract. The university is still paying Bielema as part of an $11.8 million buyout.
Assistant coach and former Razorback quarterback Barry Lunney Jr. will serve as interim head coach for the rest of the season.
LSU is landslide No. 1 after win
LSU is an overwhelming No. 1 in the Associated Press poll after beating Alabama in a No. 1 vs. No. 2 matchup, and Minnesota moved into the top 10 for the first time in 57 years.
After two weeks of historically close voting at the top of poll, LSU received 54 first-place votes in the AP Top 25. Ohio State was No. 2 with five first-place votes and Clemson was third with three first-place votes. Alabama fell two spots to No. 4.
Georgia was fifth, followed by Oregon and Minnesota at No. 7. The Gophers won Saturday’s other matchup of unbeaten teams, defeating Penn State at home. The Nittany Lions slipped four spots to No. 9.
SEC showdown gets big TV rating
The LSU-Alabama game drew 16.636 million viewers for CBS, making it the mostwatched game of the season
CBS said LSU’s 46-41 victory against Alabama, a matchup of the AP Top 25’s No. 1 and No. 2 teams, scored a 9.7 rating, the highest for any regularseason college football game on any network in eight years.
The Tigers and Crimson Tide kicked off in the afternoon for the first time since 2010 because CBS had used its one night game on Notre Dame-Georgia in September. That was the previous most-watched game of the season at 9.349 million viewers.