Arkansas coach Sam Pittman faces the same challenge that Texas’ Steve Sarkisian does this week in preparing his players for Saturday.

None of Pittman’s players were alive when the Arkansas-Texas rivalry mattered.

Long gone are the Southwest Conference days when the Hogs and Horns tangled annually in front of wild, worked-up crowds. Sure, some players on both sides remain from the 2021 matchup. That night conjured up the old magic, to be sure. But it wasn’t quite like the old days.

So Pittman has been “showing the kids” video tape from the 1964 game that Arkansas won 14-13 and the 1969 video of the “Game of the Century” or “Big Shootout,” as UT coach Darrell Royal called it.

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The two teams stopped playing annually after the 1991 season when Arkansas left the SWC for the Southeastern Conference. The series picked up again in the 2000 Cotton Bowl, and there was a home-and-home series in 2003 and 2004. The 2008 matchup was the first of another two-game contract that wasn’t completed until 2021.

“When we played them in the Texas Bowl in ’14, I hadn’t been to the national championship game at that point. I hadn’t been with Georgia,” Pittman said. “But it felt different when we got off the bus. It was two 6-6 teams, and it was electric. Then when we come in here (in 2021), at that point, I think that was the largest crowd we’d had in several years and the rush of the field and all that kind of stuff.

“So you can just feel that rivalry. You know, you can feel it from our people.”

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Pittman agreed that current-day Texas (8-1, 4-1 SEC) is a far cry from the team that went to Fayetteville in September 2021. The talent level is “certainly a lot faster, bigger that what they were the last time we played them in here.” Arkansas (5-4, 3-3) hasn’t moved that much closer to an SEC title since the last meeting, though.

“The type schematics that they're running is what Georgia defense did a lot,” Pittman said. “Basically, they’re saying we’re better than you. We're going to line up and whip-your-butt type mentality.”

Pittman called Sarkisian “a mastermind offensively” for how he called plays in the 2020 national championship game for Alabama. “I thought was the greatest called game I'd ever saved by an offensive coordinator,” he said.

What Sarkisian did with the Crimson Tide is what he’s doing now with the Longhorns, Pittman said. “Perimeter explosiveness, and he uses his talent really, really well, and has plenty of it.”

The Razorbacks are no slouches when it comes to offense. Led by quarterback Taylen Green, Arkansas ranks fifth nationally in yards per game (483.6) and tied for 34th in points (33.0).

Pittman’s issue is in the defensive secondary, where the Hogs have opened positions this week. The coach said he’d need a few more days to determine who would start at both corner and safety. Arkansas ranks 125th nationally in pass defense.

“The fans would say Texas is the biggest rival that we have,” Pittman said. “I think you have to educate the kids. You can play better in a rivalry game if you think it’s a rival. We’re going to have to play our best if we’re going to win the game.”