Sam Pittman: 'I'm not worried about my job security'

Now in his fourth season as the Arkansas head coach, Sam Pittman has the worst record he’s had since his first season, 3-7. That was during the pandemic and a year after Arkansas went winless in SEC play. That step backward in on-field success has, in turn, led to concerns about Pittman’s job security.

Despite all of that, Pittman isn’t worried about his job security right now.

“I think it’s hard, obviously, to block out all noise,” Sam Pittman said. “We’ve got a job to do. That is to get prepared each and every week. But Jamie and I, when we got here, we were planning on coaching here until whatever that date was that we were going down to Hot Springs and call it a day. I’m not close to that year right now.”

Following Week 11, there was a rash of firings around college football, including in the SEC. Two SEC West coaches, Jimbo Fisher and Zach Arnett were fired. That raised the question of who would be next to lose their job. For Pittman, the plan is to get back to winning as soon as possible at Arkansas.

“The plan is to get this program back to where it deserves to be and stay here as long as we possibly can.”

Admittedly, for Sam Pittman, the outside noise does have an impact on the program. In particular, he pointed out that it makes recruiting harder.

“So, it’s hard. It’s hard to block out noise. It’s more like for the kids, for the recruits. Once it starts, negative stuff, it’s about recruiting. I know what’s going on, Hunter Yurachek knows what’s going. But nobody else. It’s opinion. They don’t know what’s really going on. But it affects our recruits. We spent a lot of time yesterday with that as well,” Pittman said.

“My job is to get ready for FIU. I’m not worried about my job security at all and I think I’m the guy for the university and I want to stay here for a long time.”

Sam Pittman on if Kenny Guiton is candidate for full-time offensive coordinator job

Sam Pittman already made a major change to his staff amid the difficult season, firing offensive coordinator Dan Enos. In his place, Kenny Guiton is acting as the interim. That’s a role that Sam Pittman says he could earn full-time with a successful end of the season.

“The first part of that, absolutely. I really don’t know how I could not look at him after that performance. I spoke with him a little bit about that as well, about our timeline, and what we’re going to do. But, absolutely. Then, I think what you would do at that point if you decided to stay in-house is figure out what position he would feel most comfortable with coaching from that coordinator spot,” Pittman said.

“Certainly, we haven’t made that decision yet, but I don’t know how he could’ve done a better job than what he did on Saturday, to be perfectly honest with you. With everything, just imagine you had Fall Camp and you played that way your first game. Then you add all the things that went on and you had a two week window to prepare, and I think he called a freaking great game and had them off balance. I think he did a great job.”