The darkness is threatening to settle in around the Arkansas basketball team.
Just over a week ago, the Hogs were knocking on the door of the top 10. Now, after a loss to UNC-Greensboro and Memphis, Arkansas now has to beat North Carolina and Duke in back-to-back games to avoid a 4-4 start.
The Tar Heels come first in the third-place game of the Battle 4 Atlantis on Friday. Tip time is scheduled for noon CT on ESPN.
Arkansas wasn’t terrible in falling to Memphis on Thanksgiving, but too many turnovers and three technical fouls proved too much. That and Memphis forward David Jones, who scored a career-high 36 points.
Now the Hogs get a North Carolina program that has owned them over the last decade. The last time the two met was in 2017 in a regular-season tournament in Oregon. UNC won by 19 points. Before that, the Tar Heels knocked Arkansas out of the NCAA Tournament in the second round in both 2015 and 2017.
Arkansas’ No. 20 ranking is likely to drop when polls are released Monday. North Carolina’s No. 14 one may or may not, depending on the result against the Razorbacks.
But Arkansas’ NCAA Tournament case is far more tenuous. If the Hogs lose to North Carolina, wins over Duke and Oklahoma are all but required if they want to carry any semblance of a decent nonconference resume into postseason qualification.