Category: Arkansas basketball

Arkansas basketball coach John Calipari provided a scheduling update of sorts at the SEC spring meetings in Florida Wednesday.

While he didn’t name any opponents, Calipari told assembled reporters that the Razorbacks will play non-conference games in Dallas and North Little Rock. Calipari added that he also wants Arkansas to play at Madison Square Garden in New York.

“Most of the stuff is done (in terms of) who we’re playing, and then there may be one team that I try to do a home-and-home with,” Calipari said. “But we’re going to play in North Little Rock. We’re going to play in Dallas. You need national games. You’ve got to play in Madison Square Garden.”

Calipari added that networks like ESPN and CBS had reached out to him about televising games.

“Some of the games I’ve scheduled, you get calls from ESPN, different events, CBS (asking), ‘Can you do this? Can you do this?'” Calipari said. “Until I get the rest of the roster, I probably won’t fully do the schedule, but we’re in good shape right now. I’m juiced about it. Like, let’s go.”

While Arkansas waits to finalize its non-conference schedule, the 2024-25 SEC schedule was released earlier this month. Arkansas will play both home and away games against LSU, Missouri and Texas. They’ll face Kentucky at Rupp Arena when Calipari makes his highly anticipated return to Lexington. Official dates and tipoff times for conference games have not been announced.

RELATED: Arkansas’ all-time series record against every 2024-25 SEC basketball opponent

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D.J. Wagner, a 6-foot-3 guard and former No. 1 overall recruit in the class of 2023, is following John Calipari to Fayetteville, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette’s Richard Davenport reported late Sunday.

Wagner was a consensus five-star recruit out of high school and a McDonald’s All-American. In his freshman season at Kentucky, he averaged almost 10 points per game (9.9) to go with 1.9 rebounds and 3.3 assists.

Wagner played in 29 games for the Wildcats and scored a season-high 28 points in their early-season matchup against Marshall on November 24, a 118-82 Kentucky victory.

He had 13 games in double figures, seven of which came in SEC play. Wagner’s 19 points in Kentucky’s 111-102 victory over Arkansas at Rupp Arena on March 2 was his season-high in conference action. He shot 40.5 percent from the field last season.

Per 247Sports’ Travis Branham:

“Wagner is a tough, hard-nosed guard that competes on every possession he is on the floor.

He is capable of playing both on and off the ball with his biggest value coming in the intangibles he brings to the floor as a fearless competitor.

His freshman year didn’t live up to the lofty expectations set before him but with an improved jumper this season, he could have a breakout sophomore campaign in Fayetteville.”

Wagner is the eighth addition to the Arkansas program since Calipari was named Razorbacks head coach on April 10 and the third former Kentucky player to follow Calipari to Arkansas. Adou Thiero and Zvonimir Ivisic previously joined the Hogs this off-season.

Three high school recruits also flipped their commitments to Arkansas after previously committing to Kentucky: point guard Boogie Fland and wings Karter Knox and Billy Richmond.

What was long-known as coming was finally officially announced by Arkansas on Thursday.

Brad Calipari will serve as an assistant coach on the basketball team. John Calipari, his father, was hired as head coach about two months ago.

The younger Calipari spent last year as director of on-court player development under Jerry Stackhouse at Vanderbilt. Before that, he held the same role at Long Island University. Previously, he was a graduate assistant on his father’s staff at Kentucky.

John Calipari’s staff additions have all been familiar to him. Kenny Payne, Chin Coleman and Chuck Martin were all announced has having joined Arkansas already. They all came from Kentucky. Additionally, John Calipari has said former graduate assistant Kentucky guard Tyler Ulis would join the staff in Fayetteville, too.

More additions are expected for the Razorbacks both on the coaching and development side and on the roster. Arkansas currently has seven scholarship players locked in for next year.

Arkansas coach John Calipari’s introduction to the masses, to the rank-and-file of the state began Tuesday as the basketball head man was on the road for the school’s typical spring get-to-ya.

Calipari, just about a month into the job, is already playing the greatest hits. He made jokes about the low number of players on his first roster and shared the story of how he landed at Arkansas. The tales made sense considering it’s that sort of congenial personality that has made him beloved everywhere he has coached.

Arkansas fans have quickly warmed, too, even though he was persona non grata during his time at Kentucky. But his success at Kentucky – plus his success at Memphis and UMass before that – also make him the sort of hire that satiates a desire for Razorbacks Nation to consider itself one of the big boys.

Only seven players are on the Arkansas roster as of early Wednesday morning. An eighth is likely by the weekend in Kentucky transfer DJ Wagner, whose father also played for Calipari at Memphis. The coach was quick to say that even though the seven he currently has are dynamite, depth is required.

“I’m coaching everybody. I don’t just coach the guys that are starting, I’m coaching them all,” he said. “Basically, I’m preparing them and putting my soul and everything for another guy to coach them. … Well, how about I just focus on my eight or nine and let me do that?”