FAYETTEVILLE — At least one losing streak will be snapped Sunday at Bud Walton Arena, and the Arkansas women’s basketball team hopes it won’t be two.
Arkansas (17-9, 5-6 SEC), losers of two consecutive games, is scheduled to host a reeling Missouri team at 3 p.m. on SEC Network.
The Tigers have lost six games in a row and will be looking to put their losing streak to rest along with an even lengthier skid.
The Razorbacks have beaten Missouri (11-13, 2-9) the past 11 times the teams have met, including a 67-58 victory Jan. 28 in Columbia, Mo.
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“They’re just on another level of familiarity,” Arkansas coach Mike Neighbors said. “Because they’ve been our double opponent every year since we’ve been here, and then we’ve drawn them in the last two years in the SEC Tournament as well.
“So there’s no need for us to [go to the film room] and show a bunch of clips of Hayley Frank stepping behind ball screens or curling ball screens, or Mama Dembele. We could literally skip all of our film sessions. We won’t. We’ll remind them, but it’ll be fast. It helps.”
Arkansas is amid a crucial end-of-season stretch and is looking to earn at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament. ESPN listed the Razorbacks as the fifth team left out of its most recent “Bracketology” projection.
Defeating the Tigers, who are tied with Georgia and Kentucky for last place in the SEC, is likely mandatory for Arkansas in its pursuit of its third NCAA Tournament appearance in four years.
“I think now my job and our job as coaches is to provide the proper perspective, because the information is out there,” Neighbors said. “We have all come to grips in this profession that we wake up with a number beside our name every day. Players, coaches, [sports information directors], we all live with that. We live with a number, a ranking, an evaluation every single morning.”
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The number Neighbors referred to was his team’s NCAA Evaluation Tool (NET) ranking of No. 64. The seventh-year coach expressed his frustration with the metric following his team’s 81-55 loss at Tennessee on Monday, saying he has “lost respect for the NET” this year.
He reiterated some of his concerns ahead of the Missouri game.
“Vanderbilt went on the road and won at Texas A&M, who were 30 spots ahead of them in the NET, and dropped a spot,” Neighbors said. “Now, I don’t have a good context for it or a good perspective for it, but it is what it is right now. None of us really understand on the women’s side because of the lack of knowledge of the formula. We don’t know how any of that’s working.”
Arkansas is tied with Texas A&M and Vanderbilt, two teams it will face over the final five games, for eighth place in the SEC. All three team are in the NCAA Tournament conversation, but could fall into the league’s bottom four.
“If you’ve looked at our league standings, it’s nuts,” Neighbors said. “Like you could literally finish still anywhere from fourth to last. It’s crazy, somebody is going to play on [the first day of the SEC Tournament] this year in our league with five wins.
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“I don’t know that a five-win team has ever played on a Wednesday since we’ve expanded.”
Missouri forward Hayley Frank, a preseason All-SEC selection, has missed the past three games with an undisclosed day-to-day injury. Following her team’s most recent game, a 70-59 loss to Auburn last Sunday, Tigers coach Robin Pingeton indicated Frank may be ready for the game against the Razorbacks.
“The only thing I’ll tell you is I think we’re really close,” Pingeton said. “We thought there was a possibility [against Auburn], but I always want to put the student-athlete’s wellbeing first. There’s no guarantees, but I feel like we’re getting really, really close and with the bye week, we’re hoping to have her back for Arkansas.”
Arkansas may have guard Carly Keats back. Keats broke her nose during the first meeting against Missouri and has since missed four games.
“I do think the bye week was very helpful,” Neighbors said of not playing Thursday. “[There was] much-needed recovery for specifically Keats. She was able to practice [Thursday] without contact and [Friday she practiced] with contact. If everything goes well there, and she adjusts to having the mask on, she should be full-go for Sunday.”
ASHLAND TOWNSHIP, Mich. — An Arkansas man died after crashing a dirt bike on Sunday.
The 21-year-old Arkansas man, formerly from Newaygo, crashed into a tree while riding a dirt bike on private property in Ashland Township near Grant on Sunday before 2:30 p.m., according to Michigan State Police (MSP) troopers.
Emergency responders tried to save his life but he died at the scene.
Troopers are still investigating but do not suspect drugs or alcohol as factors in the crash.
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MSP did not initially release any additional information.
FAYETTEVILLE — Arkansas softball will once again host an NCAA Regional, this time as the No. 5 overall national seed.
The Razorbacks (42-11) will be the top seed in Fayetteville and open the tournament against fourth-seeded Fordham (27-26) at 4:30 p.m. on Friday, May 15.
Washington (36-18) is the two-seed and will face three-seed South Florida (42-15) that same day inside Bogle Park.
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Arkansas is paired with the Durham Regional hosted by Duke (39-14) for a potential super regional. Arizona (35-16), Marshall (37-17) and Howard (28-17) are joining the Blue Devils in the regional.
This is the sixth consecutive season the Razorbacks will host a regional. It is also the program’s eighth straight NCAA Tournament berth under coach Courtney Deifel. Arkansas has reached the NCAA tournament 14 times, and more than half of those appearances have come under Deifel.
Arkansas ended the season No. 1 in the RPI despite finishing seventh in the SEC standings. The Hogs were eliminated by Alabama in the conference tournament quarterfinals.
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Last year, Arkansas lost to SEC rival Ole Miss in the Super Regionals. The Hogs fell one win shy of reaching the Women’s College World Series for the first time in program history. They are hoping to take that elusive next step this summer and book a trip to Oklahoma City in two weeks time.
Jackson Fuller covers Arkansas football, basketball and baseball for the Southwest Times Record, part of the USA TODAY Network. Reach him at jfuller@usatodayco.com or follow him @jacksonfuller16 on X, formerly known as Twitter.
In the race to build data centers across Arkansas, the Google campus at West Memphis has taken the lead. Google is already hiring electrical engineers and facilities technicians.
I spent several days in West Memphis last summer to report on the amazing economic developments in Crittenden County. Those developments include the explosive growth of Southland Casino, a future Buc-ee’s location adjacent to Interstate 40, and a future water park and hotel complex known as Epic Resort. But even though an official announcement had not been made, city and county officials couldn’t help talking off the record about Google.
That announcement came in October when Google officials confirmed that they will spend $4 billion through the end of 2027. At the time, it was the largest private investment announcement in Arkansas history. The biggest previous capital investment was $3 billion spent on the recently completed Big River Steel II plant in south Mississippi County.
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West Memphis Mayor Marco McClendon believes the total investment by Google could wind up being $7 billion to $10 billion. McClendon said the first phase of the campus will employ about 300 people, with thousands working at the site at the peak of construction.
McClendon said property taxes on the site will produce millions of dollars per year for the West Memphis School District.
The project is being built on an 1,100-acre tract and is expected to take between 18 and 24 months to complete. The campus will include data center structures, office buildings, a power substation, and other infrastructure. In partnership with Entergy Corp., Google will cover the costs associated with powering the facilty. Laura Landreaux, president and CEO of Entergy Arkansas, said the project will “stimulate economic growth in northeast Arkansas and across the state.”
“This project is more than just jobs, buildings and technology,” McClendon said. “It’s about the future of our city, opportunity, investment and education.”
Laurel Brown, regional head of data center public affairs at Google, said: “We’re also working together to bring solar energy and battery storage resources online. We’ll integrate innovative load flexibility into our power contract to reduce our usage during times when the grid is constrained.”
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Google plans to invest $25 million to implement energy efficiency initiatives in this part of the Arkansas Delta. McClendon promises that there will be more announcements regarding what he calls a “community development agreement” between Google and the city. The energy efficiency program will focus on home weatherization, efficiency technology, and energy workforce development.
Google also announced that the University of Arkansas and Arkansas State University will be among the first cohort of what’s known as Google AI for Education Accelerators. Students, faculty and staff will be given access at no cost to Google career certificates and AI training classes.
The West Memphis project, however, didn’t stay atop the list of largest announced capital investments for long.
We learned in January that AVAIO Digital Partners of Connecticut will build a $6 billion facility just south of Little Rock. The 760-acre tract is north of 145th Street and west of Wrightsville. AVAIO officials said the cost could grow to more than $21 billion (think of the tax revenue a project that size could bring) if all elements are added. AVAIO officials said the user of the site will hire more than 500 employees during the next five years.
Sydney Sasser wrote in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette: “The center will be designed to host the computing, networking and data storage technologies (and the power infrastructure) that underpin cloud computing and artificial intelligence applications. … AVAIO plans to lease space in the data center to other data companies.”
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“It’s our intention that this extraordinary site in the Little Rock area will be both a major pole of data center capacity and an engine of sustained economic and technological momentum for Arkansas,” said Mark McComiskey, the AVAIO CEO.
As is the case in West Memphis, Entergy will supply power for the AVAIO campus.
Just two days after the AVAIO announcement, the Democrat-Gazette reported that Google is the company developing a data center at the nearby Port of Little Rock. Google had yet to announce its involvement in the project. Google is also expected to construct a data center at Conway.
A document that was later submitted by Google to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said the campus at the Port of Little Rock will consist of five industrial buildings totaling 1.43 million square feet, two office buildings and an electrical substation.
“Google’s center will also contain transmission lines, a sewer lift station and a parking lot,” Lucas Dufalla wrote in the Democrat-Gazette. “Construction will involve filling about 16.8 acres of wetlands. Google plans to purchase wetland mitigation credits as an offset, according to the application.”
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A revised public notice posted by the Corps said the data center at the port will “likely draw more than 100 megawatts of power.”
So we know Google will have at least three data center campuses in Arkansas–at West Memphis, Little Rock, and Conway. What we don’t know is how many billions of dollars Google eventually will invest in the state.
“Google is investing in the next generation of AI innovation in Arkansas and across the country,” said Ruth Porat, the company’s president and chief investment officer. “We see AI and the energy powering it to be the innovations that will define this century. The upside of AI cannot be unlocked without the energy it requires. That’s why Google is building energy capacity that protects affordability for ratepayers and creates jobs that will drive the AI-powered economy.”
Entergy’s Landreaux described the partnership between Google and Entergy as “a turning point for our state.”
In Clarksville, meanwhile, Serverfarm, a data center developer based in Los Angeles, has plans for a 135-acre campus. The project, located north of Interstate 40, could cost $8 billion with six buildings covering 2.16 million square feet. The land was acquired last October. It was then rezoned from rural to industrial use. The project is expected to be built in three phases. It’s not clear how much the first phase will cost.
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Serverfarm is building data center projects around the world. It’s owned by Manulife, the largest insurance company in Canada and one of the 30 largest fund managers in the world.
In southwest Arkansas, the Economic Development Corp. of Clark County voted last month to sell the 991-acre Southwest Arkansas Mega Site south of Arkadelphia to an unnamed buyer for a data center campus. Members of the board were told that the buyer would make a minimum investment of $1 billion.
Shelley Short, CEO of the Arkadelphia Regional Economic Development Alliance, said: “I’m incredibly excited, but we’ll have to be patient.”
The deal, however, quickly fell through. The Southwest Arkansas Mega Site is back on the market.
During last year’s legislative session, lawmakers changed the definition of data center projects that qualify for tax breaks. Act 548 added to the definition of a “qualified investment” to include a “qualified large data center” that can be but isn’t limited to “nonadjacent physical locations that are connected to each other by fiber and associated equipment.”
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Rex Nelson is a senior editor at the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.
Rex Nelson
rnelson@adgnewsroom.com
Rex Nelson has been senior editor and columnist at the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette since 2017, and he has a biweekly podcast called “Southern Fried.”
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After graduating from Ouachita Baptist University in 1981, he was a sportswriter for the Arkansas Democrat for a year before becoming editor of Arkadelphia’s Daily Siftings Herald. He was the youngest editor of a daily in Arkansas at age 23. Rex was then news and sports director at KVRC-KDEL from 1983-1985.
He returned to the Democrat as assistant sports editor in 1985. From 1986-1989, he was its Washington correspondent. He left to be Jackson T. Stephens’ consultant.
Rex became the Democrat-Gazette’s first political editor in 1992, but left in 1996 to join then-Gov. Mike Huckabee’s office. He also served from 2005-09 in the administration of President George W. Bush.
From 2009-2018, he worked stints at the Communications Group, Arkansas’ Independent Colleges and Universities, and Simmons First National Corp.
