Arkansas' Sam Pittman, Hunter Yurachek fine with either SEC schedule model, laud single division as selling point for both

The topic dominating discussion at SEC meetings in Florida this week is what scheduling model the league will settle on for the 2024 season and beyond, when the league balloons to 16 teams. For Arkansas AD Hunter Yurachek and football coach Sam Pittman, the real benefit of a new format has nothing to do with the amount of games being played.

Eight conference games or nine, the Razorbacks brass will be glad to not be in the SEC West any long as the league moves to a division-less model, regardless of the number of conference games. Getting out from under the likes of Alabama and LSU could be a boon for Arkansas.

“What’s favorable for the University of Arkansas is going from the SEC West to a single division where you have the opportunity to have a more balance schedule and an opportunity, as coach said, for each team to come into your stadium once in a four-year period and for you to visit each stadium,” Yurachek said on the “The Paul Finebaum Show” on Tursday. “We’ve been in the SEC West and coach has done a phenomenal job. I believe you’ve beat every team in the west but one, that school down in Tuscaloosa. So he’s done a great job of navigating that. But I think a more balanced schedule is what’s best for the University of Arkansas. And whether it’s eight or nine games, coach and I will figure out what it looks like after that.”

If the league sticks with eight games, Yurachek will be fine with that. The SEC has been plenty successful in dominating the College Football Playoff — both in terms of teams in the field and championships won — with an eight-game model.

“You look at our domination of the CFP and advancing one and/or two teams most years. Having the national champion most years. The eight-game formula has worked so if that’s what decide and move forward with it’s going to be what’s best for the Southeastern Conference,” Yurachek said.

Pittman concurred with his AD, sharing that the guarantee of playing against every team in the league home and away in a four-year span is a nice selling point of either model.

“And every team is going to get to come in and play in Razorback Stadium,” Pittman said. “And I think for our fans that’s going to be really cool, too. Eight or nine, I think either way, they’ve got — they’ve got it kind of figured out, I think. … It’s not broke right now, I don’t know what they’re going to do but we’re taking teams to the national championship. And with eight it’s not broke. If they decide to go to nine we’ll do that as well.”