Arkansas AD Hunter Yurachek says Bobby Petrino was not hired to take Sam Pittman's job

Arkansas’ decision late last month to bring back former head coach Bobby Petrino as the team’s offensive coordinator stunned many given Petrino’s ignominious exit from the university in 2012.

Beyond that, though, it raised some questions – namely, what the arrival of Petrino, a veteran coach with a successful track record, meant for embattled Razorbacks coach Sam Pittman.

According to Pittman and Petrino’s boss, it’s nothing more than speculation.

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In an interview with Hogs+, the digital content network of the Arkansas athletic department, Razorbacks athletic director Hunter Yurachek said Petrino is “not here to take Sam’s job” and that his once-unimaginable return to Fayetteville is for another purpose.

“He’s here to help change the dynamics of our offense,” Yurachek said. “Who better to do that than one of the brightest offensive minds in college football?”

Indeed, Petrino has established a reputation over the past 20 years as one of the most decorated offensive minds in the sport.

It was particularly apparent in his previous stint at Arkansas. From 2009-11, the final three seasons of Petrino’s four-year tenure, the Razorbacks finished among the top 20 FBS teams in scoring offense each season and never averaged fewer than 36 points per game.

Most recently, in his lone season as Texas A&M’s offensive coordinator in 2023, he helped the Aggies’ previously dreadful offense improve its scoring average by 11.4 points per game, vaulting it to No. 25 among FBS teams from 101st in 2022.

That demonstrated offensive success and the warm, positive memories from his first go-around in Fayetteville, though, could make him an attractive option if Arkansas struggles for another season under Pittman, who is coming off a 4-8 season and has gone 23-25 in four seasons with the program. Petrino went 34-17 at Arkansas from 2008-11 and has a career FBS record of 119-56.

Yurachek released a statement on Nov. 19 stating that Pittman would remain the program's coach.

Despite leading the Razorbacks to a 21-5 mark and a pair of major bowl games in his final two seasons, Petrino was fired for what then-athletic director Jeff Long described as a “pattern of misleading and manipulative behavior designed to deceive me and members of the athletic staff” following a motorcycle wreck involving Petrino and his 25-year-old mistress, Jessica Dorrell, who had been hired the previous month as Arkansas’ player development coordinator.

The messy, scandalous and regrettable end to his otherwise-accomplished tenure is one reason, among others, why Yurachek said Petrino wished to come back to Fayetteville more than a decade later.

“I think he has paid his dues,” Yurachek said. “When he reached out through back channels, what he said is he wanted to come here and right his wrongs and really help coach Pittman get this program back to where he believed it could be and where it was when he was the head coach.”

This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Hunter Yurachek: Bobby Petrino was not hired to take Sam Pittman's job