Just when it seemed like Arkansas had finally figured it out.
After a disastrous 0-5 start to SEC play, John Calipari's team had righted the ship, winning six of their next 10 including Quad 1 games over Kentucky, Missouri and Texas. With a big win over Michigan in the non-conference to hang their hat on, the Hogs seemed to have played themselves onto the right side of the NCAA Tournament bubble.
Of course, as any Kentucky fan can (and certainly will) tell you, Calipari's teams have a nasty habit of stumbling at the most baffling times. And sure enough, that's exactly what happened to Arkansas on Saturday: Facing the worst team in the SEC in South Carolina, the Razorbacks put up arguably their worst performance of the season, falling into an 18-3 hole early and never climbing out of it in an ugly 72-53 loss.
All that progress, down the drain in the course of a couple of hours. One bad loss can't make or break a team's NCAA Tournament hopes, of course; there's still a lot of basketball left to be played before Selection Sunday, with two more games against tourney teams in Vanderbilt and Mississippi State plus the SEC Tournament in Nashville. But the Razorbacks had very little margin for error as it is, and this loss is going to stick out like a sore thumb to the committee.
Arkansas Bracketology: Does South Carolina loss doom John Calipari's NCAA Tournament hopes?
ESPN's Joe Lunardi had Arkansas among his Last Four In during his most recent bracket projection earlier this week, and it wasn't hard to figure out why: While the Hogs' overall record may not be particularly impressive, going through the gauntlet of a historically rugged SEC deserved to be graded on a curve. The overwhelming majority of the team's losses, priority to Saturday at least, were eminently respectable, nine in Quad 1 games and just two in Quad 2.
That latter number now stands at three, though, and really puts a dent in Arkansas' case to the committee that it had become a new team over the last few weeks. The Hogs' offense had been a question mark all year, and it was downright ugly on Saturday, as the team shot just 15-of-52 from the floor and 3-of-22 from 3. All the old problems that led to such a brutal start to conference play reared their head again, and that will loom large in the committee's mind unless Arkansas gives them something else to think about between now and Selection Sunday.
There will be opportunities, as there always are in this conference. The Hogs have two Quad 1 games to close the regular season, at Vanderbilt and at home against Mississippi State. Win both of those, and six Quad 1 wins plus an 8-10 conference record will be hard to ignore (assuming disaster doesn't strike in the SEC Tournament). And the Razorbacks got some help on the bubble on Saturday, as teams like Oklahoma and Nebraska also lost.
But it's safe to say that this loss puts Calipari's back against the wall for the next two weeks. Arkansas can no longer just tread water; they once again find themselves in a position where they have to go chase a bid, rather than hoping not to give one away. Given how dispiriting Saturday's performance was, it's hard to have a lot of faith in that pursuit.