Photo courtesy of Arkansas Athletics
Entering his 23rd season leading the Arkansas baseball program, Dave Van Horn had done his fair share of adapting to the times.
With the transfer portal and NIL now part of the equation, though, that is harder than ever for coaches of his generation. However, the 64-year-old has seen what’s unfolded across the country and has tried to get out ahead of a common criticism of his era.
Rather than keeping his pitchers and position players separate through the offseason, Van Horn told reporters that he had his strength and conditioning staff bring them together near the end of the fall semester and add a competition aspect to the workouts.
That all sounds like coach-speak, but the result is one emotionally scarred Arkansas fans will be glad to hear.
“I think it advanced us a little bit,” Van Horn said. “You see all that’s going on all over the country, you have teams that are super talented in other sports, it’s semiprofessional now — call it what it is — so I feel like our job as coaches is to find a way to develop these guys physically, but mentally we’ve got to find a way to get them to bond and care about each other and care about the University of Arkansas and the fans, and not just in and out of here. I don’t feel that way with this team. I feel this team, they’re on a mission.”
Money and the transfer portal can certainly help — just look at Ohio State’s $20 million football roster — but Dave Van Horn is more aware than ever of the team-building side of things.
He has navigated that aspect rather well so far, even admitting in the past to being outbid for certain players and instead getting players who fit the culture.
Still, the Arkansas baseball program has not completely avoided criticism on that front. One local radio show host infamously went on a “rental player” rant in 2022, but that actually fueled a run to the College World Series semifinals in 2022.
Of course, that was the last time Arkansas made it to Omaha. The Razorbacks being knocked out of a home regional each of the last two seasons is a fact not lost on Van Horn, his staff or his players.
“There’s been some things go down the last couple of years at the end of the season that have been hard to swallow,” Van Horn said. “Honestly, behind closed doors, the coaches, we knew we weren’t maybe quite as good as we were ranked or whatever, but we were just finding ways to win. Credit to the players for that. This team wants to make sure we get to the end.”
They understand that expectations in Fayetteville are higher than just contending for conference titles and top-8 national seeds. Seeing six different SEC foes reach the mountain top over the last seven postseasons — with Arkansas coming agonizingly close to making it seven in seven — has only added to the desire for the Razorbacks to win their first national championship.
That journey officially gets underway with a four-game series against Washington State beginning Feb. 14, but three weeks of preseason practices, which started on Jan. 24, leading up to that date come first.
2025 Razorback baseball schedule
Feb. 14-17 — Washington State
* Feb. 21 — Kansas State – Arlington, Texas
*Feb. 22 — TCU – Arlington, Texas
*Feb. 23 — Michigan – Arlington, Texas
Feb. 25 — Grambling
Feb. 28-Mar. 2 — Charlotte
March 4-5 — ULM
March 7-9 — Portland
March 14-16 — at Ole Miss
March 18-19 — Oral Roberts
March 21-23 — South Carolina
March 25 — Missouri State
Mach 28-30 — at Vanderbilt
**April 1 — UAPB
April 4-6 — Missouri
April 8 — Arkansas State
April 11-13 — at Georgia
April 15 — UAPB
April 17-19 — Texas A&M
April 22-23 — Little Rock
April 25-27 — at Florida
April 29 — at Missouri St.
May 2-4 — Texas
May 9-11 — at LSU
May 15-17 — Tennessee
Home games in bold
* College Baseball Series at Globe Life Field
**at Dickey-Stephens Park in North Little Rock
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