“I haven’t been that sold on a coach that quickly I think ever in my career.”

Former Nebraska athletic director Bill Byrne after interviewing Dave Van Horn for the Cornhuskers’ job in 1997. Van Horn left Nebraska to become Arkansas’ coach in 2002.

head coach on June 21, 2002, he told reporters he didn’t plan to move again.

“Norm wanted me, I felt like, to take over the job that he had been at for 33 years, and I felt a lot of loyalty to him and the university,” Van Horn said. “It was difficult, but obviously it felt like it was a great move.”

A year before he was hired at Arkansas, a member of Georgia’s search committee spoke to Van Horn about its coaching vacancy. The interest felt serious until the committee member asked the question: If you came here and Norm DeBriyn retired in a year or two, what would keep you from going there?

“I said, ‘Well, maybe nothing,’ ” Van Horn recalled. “That was that.”

In 2004, Van Horn coached Arkansas to a regular-season SEC championship — split with Georgia — after the Razorbacks were predicted to finish 11th in the league in the preseason. Arkansas was a national seed for the first time, won a home regional for the first time and swept Florida State in its first home super regional.

An announced crowd of 10,027 — an NCAA record for a super regional game at that time — packed Baum Stadium for Game 2 when Arkansas clinched its trip to Omaha.

Fans have poured through the gates by the hundreds of thousands each season since 2005, with Arkansas finishing in the top five nationally in attendance each year. The Razorbacks have clinched three more trips to the College World Series on their home field and have gone to Omaha six times total under Van Horn, who has the most CWS appearances among active coaches.

In March, Van Horn won his 700th game at Arkansas.

Next year the baseball program will open a $27 million operations center. Next door is a state-of-the-art indoor practice area.

“It’s really rewarding, to be honest with you, to see all that has gone on over the years,” Van Horn said. “It’s like anything else you do in life, you want to see things get better and accomplish things, and be part of it.”

Broyles, who retired in 2007 and died in 2017, had a running joke as Van Horn built the Razorbacks into one of the nation’s premier teams.

Broyles would say the addition of 2,600 chair-back seats prior to Van Horn’s first season in 2003 was one of the dumbest things he ever agreed to, but wound up being one of the smartest decisions he ever made.