FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — There are 11 weekends remaining until the return of Arkansas football.

The Razorbacks open the 2024 season in Little Rock against UAPB. Kickoff is set for 6:30 p.m. (ESPNU) on Thursday, Aug. 29.

Arkansas is coming off a disappointing 4-8 campaign that saw offensive coordinator Dan Enos get fired midseason and the eventual departures of KJ Jefferson and Raheim ‘Rocket’ Sanders, two faces of the program.

More: Running back Ja’Quinden Jackson eager to capitalize on fresh start with Arkansas football

More: Arkansas football game time windows, kickoff vs. Texas announced by SEC

In response, the Hogs hired Bobby Petrino and hit the transfer portal, bringing in plenty of newcomers for what feels like an all-important season for head coach Sam Pittman.

Over the next month, the Southwest Times Record will run positional previews twice a week, asking two questions and providing one bold prediction. We tackled the quarterback position earlier this week.

Here’s a look at the running backs entering 2024.

Is there a clear starter at running back for Arkansas football?

Ja’Quinden Jackson and Rashod Dubinion are the leaders in the clubhouse for the starting role. Both players worked with the first team during the spring game, but Jackson handled most of the carries and scored a pair of touchdowns.

Jackson ran for 797 yards while battling an ankle injury last year at Utah. He only had nine catches out of the backfield, but he looked to be a receiving threat and a capable pass blocker during the spring. There was a revolving door at the starter’s spot in 2023, and Pittman would like some consistency at the position this season.

Dubinion is entering his third year in the program. Everyone struggled behind the offensive line last season, but Dubinion led Arkansas running backs in all-purpose yards and had some nice moments in the passing game, including a clutch 14-yard touchdown reception on the road against Alabama.

Jackson enters fall as the projected starter, but Dubinion will ensure competition rages throughout camp.

How long till Braylen Russell makes an impact?

The burly freshman was one of Arkansas’ top recruits in the previous cycle and impressed coaches the moment he stepped on campus. With tree trunks for legs, Russell displayed strength between the tackles and a certain athletic touch in the receiving game this spring.

Russell will be a prominent piece of the offense at some point in 2024, and it could come early in the season. Luke Hasz received similar hype coming out of his freshman preseason, and the Hogs unleashed the dynamic tight end against BYU in their first big matchup of 2023. Russell could be on a similar timeline.

One bold prediction: Hogs increase rushing output by 1,000 yards

The Hogs ran for 1,668 yards in 2023. In the year prior, Arkansas ranked eighth in the country with 3,075 yards.

The offensive line, a new offensive coordinator and some better injury luck will all propel Arkansas to a season total closer to 2022’s output. After the top three, Arkansas has quality depth with FSU transfer Rodney Hill.

Petrino will hunt explosive plays in the passing game, but a rugged ground attack will still be the backbone of the offense under Pittman. Arkansas will run for more than 2,675 yards, which would have ranked 22nd in the country last year.

What the coaches said this spring

The running back group is going to be real competitive, I think, with R-Dub and JJ probably competing for the starter. If we were playing a game at the end of the week, they would be the ones competing for that starter. The youngster, Braylen, has done a great job. He’s big. He’s really physical. He’s got great hands. It’s all new to him, so there’s times he has a far-away look in his eyes when he doesn’t know the play or can’t picture it in his mind, but he’s got a chance to be special. 

— Offensive coordinator Bobby Petrino on the running back room toward the end of spring practice.

Projected depth chart

• Ja’Quinden Jackson, redshirt senior
• Rashod Dubinion, junior
• Braylen Russell, freshman
• Rodney Hill, redshirt sophomore
• Tyrell Reed Jr., sophomore

FAYETTEVILLE — Flowood (Miss.) Hartfield Academy Class of 2025 three-star defensive tackle London Simmons was at Arkansas on Wednesday with his teammates for a 7-on-7 tournament and then he will return soon for an official visit.

Simmons, 6-3, 300, has an official visit set to Arkansas on June 21-23 along with his teammate defensive lineman Reginald Vaughn. Simmons has a long list of offers including one from the Hogs. Simmons talked about why he was at Arkansas on Wednesday.

“I’m just here to support my teammates and maybe get a little tight end work done,” Simmons said. “Just here to support my teammates and cheer them on.”

While at the 7-on-7, Simmons said he’s excited to get back in 10 days for an extended look at Arkansas.

“Yes sir, I’m definitely looking forward to it,” Simmons said. “I love the coaches here. It’s like a family environment That’s what I’m usually from. I love like family environment coaches.”

Simmons got a chance to get a early look at some of the facilities and he was impressed.

“Me just being here and the weight room is just like right up here,” Simmons said. “You have a view down on the field. It’s amazing.”

When it comes time for Simmons to pick a school he has a few particular things he’s looking for. He feels Arkansas checks plenty off of that list and he will know much more after his next visit.

“Yes sir, this is my first time visiting here so I have to see it some more,” Simmons said. “Just go around and see the campus more and talk on my official visit.”

Simmons said he likes Alabama, Florida State and more in addition to Arkansas. All three of those schools plus LSU and others have offered this talented lineman. If Simmons attends Arkansas he would play for Deke Adams.

“Coach Adams and Coach (Sam) Pittman are amazing,” Simmons said. “They are good guys to talk to. They are around like a family environment.”

As a junior, Simmons finished with 80 tackles, 25 tackles for loss, 15 sacks and three forced fumbles.

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WASHINGTON — Alabama Republican Sen. Katie Britt’s efforts to pass legislation that would block Medicaid funding from going to states that ban in vitro fertilization were unsuccessful Wednesday when Democrats blocked the bill from advancing.

Britt, who introduced the legislation earlier this year alongside Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz, said during brief debate the bill would assuage concerns about couples losing access to IVF, though Democrats said the measure fell short of providing real protections.

Debate took place shortly after the Southern Baptist Convention, the United States’ largest Protestant religious organization and one with significant influence in conservative politics, voted to condemn IVF.

It also came one day before the entire U.S. Senate is set to vote on a bill from Democrats that would provide nationwide protections for IVF. That measure also lacks the bipartisan backing needed to advance to final passage.

“For the millions of Americans who face infertility every year, IVF provides the hope of a pathway to parenthood,” Britt said on the floor. “We all have loved ones — whether they’re family members or friends — who have become parents or grandparents through IVF.”

Britt said that ensuring access to IVF is “fundamentally pro-family” and that the legislation should provide couples with “certainty and peace of mind that IVF will remain legal and available in every single state.”

Washington Democratic Sen. Patty Murray said the Britt-Cruz bill would still allow states to “enact burdensome and unnecessary” regulations on IVF that could lead to the kind of “legal uncertainty and risk” that forced IVF clinics in Alabama to close temporarily earlier this year.

“Even though it is an inherent part of the IVF process that families will make more embryos than they need,” Murray said. “This bill does absolutely nothing — not a single thing — to ensure families who use IVF can have their clinics dispose of unused embryos without facing legal threats for a standard medical procedure.”

Murray said GOP senators were completely ignoring the issue of what happens to frozen embryos and using the bill as a “PR tool.”

“The stone-cold reality is that you cannot protect IVF and champion fetal personhood,” Murray said.

State access

The Britt-Cruz legislation would prevent a state from receiving Medicaid funding if it barred access to IVF, though the bill didn’t say anything about states that define life as beginning at fertilization.

The Alabama state Supreme Court ruling earlier this year that frozen embryos constituted children didn’t explicitly ban IVF, but all of the state’s clinics stopped operating until the legislature provided civil and criminal protections.

Cruz sought to pass the bill using the unanimous consent process, where any one senator can ask for approval and any one senator can block that legislation from moving forward. Murray blocked Cruz’s request.

Unanimous consent requests don’t include a recorded vote.

The legislation had three additional co-sponsors — Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming, Roger Wicker of Mississippi and Roger Marshall of Kansas.

Democrat bill

The Senate is set to take a procedural vote as soon as Thursday on legislation from Democrats that would bolster protections for IVF, though that bill isn’t expected to get the GOP support needed to move forward.

That bill is more detailed and broader than the Britt-Cruz bill, which has received criticism from Democrats as being insufficient.

New Jersey Democratic Sen. Cory Booker said Wednesday during a press conference that access to IVF shouldn’t be turned into a political issue and called on GOP senators to back the bill.

“We can’t make this seem like a left-right issue. It’s absolutely not,” Booker said. “This is an issue that’s overwhelmingly supported in America by Republican families, Democratic families and independent families. And so trying to make this into some kind of typical political debate in Washington is just wrong.”

Booker said protecting access to IVF is, instead, “about protecting fundamental rights, expanding opportunity, taking care of our military families.”

Illinois Democratic Sen. Tammy Duckworth, the bill’s lead co-sponsor who has been open about using IVF to have her two daughters, threw cool water on working with Republicans on a bipartisan bill when asked about the possibility during the press conference.

“Well, they’re welcome to join ours and make it bipartisan. We’ve got 47 co-sponsors thus far and it’s a very simple piece of legislation,” Duckworth said. “I can’t see why they wouldn’t join it.

“In contrast, 90% of Republicans have not signed on to Senator Britt’s bill,” Duckworth added.

Southern Baptists’ resolution

Senate debate on in vitro fertilization is taking place the same week the Southern Baptist Convention meets in Indiana for its annual convention.

During that two-day gathering more than 10,000 Baptists, called messengers, voted on official policies of the SBC, which included objecting to how IVF is practiced now.

The SBC wrote in its resolution that IVF “most often engages in the destruction of embryonic human life and increasingly engages in dehumanizing methods for determining suitability for life and genetic sorting, based on notions of genetic fitness and parental preferences.”

The resolution on IVF “resolved” that members of the SBC should “only utilize reproductive technologies consistent with that affirmation” as well as several other affirmations within the document.

The resolution was titled, “On the Ethical Realities of Reproductive Technologies and the Dignity of the Human Embryo.”

Kristen Ferguson, from 11th Street Baptist Church in Upland, California, who announced the resolution before the vote, opposed an amendment that would have made several changes to the text.

Ferguson said during a brief debate the committee that wrote the resolutions for the SBC to vote on wanted to make sure it addressed IVF “with the utmost sensitivity.”

She added that members of the resolutions committee did “not take this topic lightly and we want to make sure that we’re speaking carefully about it.”