Bret Bielema's winning formula for Razorbacks comes straight from the farm
The head coach of the Hogs in Arkansas grew up on a hog farm in Illinois, which is an oft-repeated note about Bret Bielema.
Truth is, the hog farm was about as fun as it sounds. Chores began before dawn and continued until it was time to leave for school, which was taken oh-so seriously. There was more work when he returned home: farming, building, feeding, cleaning, whatever. It was never-ending with 2,500 animals around. That was the hard stuff. What Bret Bielema actually dreaded the most was physically easy.
"Mowing," he said Wednesday, noting they didn't have iPods or cell phones or anything else to distract from the monotony. "To sit on a tractor three, four hours a day was not a lot of fun for me, just doing loops around the yard."
Through it all Bielema, now 44, learned a simple lesson: There's a way to do things on a farm (or anywhere), and if you take care of the process, the results will come. It sounds simple. It isn't often carried out.
Arnie Bielema, Bret's dad, made sure it was. If Bret and his brother Bart managed to get everything done, and done right – especially their school work – Arnie would treat them to something on the weekend, maybe golf, maybe a trip to a local swimming pool. If they didn't, he didn't, and they dealt with the repercussions.
Somewhere along the way the concept became a mantra of sorts. It's now one of Bielema's favorites when talking about winning football games.
"Win this game during the course of the week," Bielema said. "It's something we really believe in…
"One of the things that I really try to preach to our guys, in life, as is the case in the game of football, you earn everything," he continued. "Whether success or failure, it's usually a byproduct of what you've done to get to where that event happened."
Arkansas has lost 13 consecutive SEC games, nine of them under the watch of Bielema, who arrived from Wisconsin last year. He took over a program that had bottomed out after Bobby Petrino wrecked his motorcycle with a personal assistant on the back.
Bielema didn't just inherit a mess, he was determined to change a great deal about the program. He was bringing with him everything from an old-school commitment to running the ball behind huge offensive linemen in a region where the spread offense is everywhere, to a focus on academic success at a place that wasn't exactly renowned for it recently. The team GPA has since soared.
He was bringing the farm to the Hogs.
This was going to be a process, and Bielema couldn't focus on week-to-week success. It wasn't as simple as practicing hard on Tuesday and Wednesday and suddenly beating Alabama on Saturday.
You had to just keep plugging, keep lifting, keep eating right, keep recruiting, keep planning, keep believing and keep doing it right. And eventually it would happen.
Only last year it didn't happen, not in SEC play. And so plenty of people wondered if Bielema was really capable of turning a corner and showing some progress. Maybe this worked only in the Big Ten.
Apparently none of those people wear Razorbacks uniforms.
Arkansas is 3-1 heading into Saturday's game with No. 6 Texas A&M in Arlington, Texas. The Razorbacks, who lost their opener at Auburn in a competitive game, are still looking for that first SEC win. It might not come against the national-contending Aggies. But it is going to come. The Bielema plan is going to work to at least some degree. That much seems obvious.
The past two victories have been impressive, a 49-28 mauling of Texas Tech in Lubbock, Texas, and a 52-14 blowout of tough Northern Illinois back in Fayetteville.
It's not just that the Razorbacks won, it's how they won that should concern the rest of the SEC. Arkansas is running the ball like Wisconsin runs the ball, and that gives them not just a different look, but a different look than expected.
They somehow manage to lead the country in scoring drives of more than six minutes and scoring drives of less than a minute, according to research by Andrew Hutchinson of Northwest Arkansas Media. They have 10 of the latter and six of the former.
Quick scores aside (most came against Nicholls), the general goal remains controlling the ball, the clock and the location of the opposing offense (on the sideline) by grinding out drives and grinding down opposing defensive lineman. In the past two games, the Razorbacks have put together nine drives of 10 or more plays. They are running the ball on 69.5 percent of their plays and gaining 7.1 yards a carry. Both Alex Collins and Jonathan Williams look headed for 1,000-yard seasons.
No wonder Bielema holds to the concept of letting his linemen – not the skill position players – fly first class on team charters.
Everyone, including old Badgers whom Bielema coached in Madison, are calling him and saying he's found the old formula. Bielema says, not quite.
"Obviously it's a different environment, I have different coaches," he said. "The exact blueprint isn't the same."
The win-during-the-week, do-your-business-right-and-a-reward-is-coming idea is.
"I think our kids know what we do Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday in preparation will carry over on Saturday," Bielema said.
And when it delivers that long-awaited SEC victory, if not this week, then soon enough?
"What a win would do," Bielema said, "is probably justify in our guys' mind that as long as they keep doing what we ask them to do offensively, defensively, special teams, what we ask them to do in the weight room, what we ask them to do in the classroom, what we ask them to do at 12 o'clock on a Friday night – all those things we ask them to consciously keep in check – if you do stay to the form, you will have success."
It's an old hog farm philosophy, and Bret Bielema isn't changing it now.
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