Williams and the Blackhawks a natural fit
It’s safe to say that Pea Ridge turned some heads back in the spring when the school replaced former coach Stephen Neal. Former Fort Smith Southside coach Jeff Williams stepped down from his position with the Mavericks, which he had been in since 2005, and made the almost 2-hour trek north to take over the Blackhawks.
“It was hard to leave for sure, being somewhere 15 years and all the great people and the administration that I worked with down there,” Williams said. “Pea Ridge just felt right. I grew up in a small town where my dad coached (Pocahontas) and for whatever reason in my career I’d always been at bigger schools. So it was intriguing to be back in that one community, one heartbeat mindset, and it was easy because of the success Pea Ridge has had lately.”
Williams had won a state championship in 2006 with the then-Rebels in just his second year after taking over for legendary coach Barry Lunney and made another appearance in the 7A title game in 2008. Lunney, as those know around here, came up to Bentonville and won four state championships with the Tigers and was a runner-up two other times. One of those wins was in the aforementioned 2008 game against Williams and Southside.
“Coach Lunney actually came by practice the other day and I told him it felt like day three of spring ball,” Williams said. “It’s been an adjustment dealing with the pandemic, but everyone else is going through the same thing, so we can’t make excuses.”
Despite getting off to a late start, the players have been resilient, and are also dealing with the challenge of moving up a classification this year.
“It’s going to be a great challenge, but we aren’t going to back down from it,” Williams said. “We will have to adjust but I’m used to playing in one of the toughest leagues in the state, having been in the 7A West and then the 7A Central for the last five years.”
The 5A-West has Harrison, which hasn’t lost a league game since 2017, as well as Morrilton, who won the 5A title as recently as 2013.
“Then you’ve got Alma who has always been good and they have a new head coach in Rusty Bush who coached with me at El Dorado,” Williams said. “I also went against him when he was at Northside. Farmington is always going to be tough with Mike Adams and then Vilonia is a team I was really impressed with last year, and they return a lot of starters. The competition is what makes it fun.”
The non conference portion of Pea Ridge’s schedule is not for slouches either. They take on defending Class 4A state runner-up Shiloh Christian in the opener, then host 6A Siloam Springs before traveling to perennially tough Prairie Grove before 5A-West conference play begins.
“The season is a marathon, not a sprint,” Williams said. “My teams a lot of the time start slow and then get better as the season goes along. It’s usually the teams that can stay healthy and improve that are in position to make the playoffs and go on a run, which is always our expectation.”
“The season is a marathon, not a sprint.”
— Jeff Williams