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Arkansas Razorbacks

intercollegiate sports teams of the University of Arkansas

Layered newspapers, civic records and oral-history reels arranged as chronological evidence
History and societyInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionSep 13, 2026
Entity authorityQ3098181
Source-derived summary

The Arkansas Razorbacks, also known as the Hogs, are the intercollegiate athletics teams representing the University of Arkansas, located in Fayetteville. The University of Arkansas student body voted to change the name of the school mascot (originally the Cardinals) in 1910 to the Arkansas Razorbacks after a hard-fought battle against LSU in which they were said to play like a "wild band of Razorback hogs" by former coach Hugo Bezdek. The Arkansas Razorbacks are the only major sports team in the U.S. with a porcine nickname, though the Texas A&M–Kingsville Javelinas play in Division II.

The University of Arkansas currently fields 19 total varsity teams (eight men's and 11 women's) in 13 sports, and competes at the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I (Football Bowl Subdivision in football) level as a member of the Southeastern Conference (SEC).

History

After classes were first held at the university, a contest was held on campus to select school colors. Cardinal (a shade of deep red) was selected over heliotrope, a shade of moderate purple. The first Arkansas football team was formed that same year and was known as the "Arkansas Cardinals". Arkansas merchandise sold at the highest levels in school history during the 2012–13 academic year when royalties through CLC ranked 10th best in the nation.

In 1909, the football team finished a 7–0 season, allowing only 18 points on defense and scoring 186 points on offense. College Football Hall of Fame coach Hugo Bezdek proclaimed his team played "like a wild band of razorback hogs". The name proved so popular that it was changed for the 1910 season.

Editorial summary

“Arkansas Razorbacks” enters the record as intercollegiate sports teams of the University of Arkansas. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Arkansas, Razorbacks and intercollegiate can confirm, complicate or overturn.

Editorial reviewA useful synthesis for locating the documentary relationships between formal authority, participants and affected communities. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1910, 2012, 1909—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. Its strongest next move is a source search built around Arkansas, Razorbacks and intercollegiate.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

“Arkansas Razorbacks” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Arkansas, Razorbacks and intercollegiate provides the most credible route into that argument.

Evidence profile

The record creator and administrative purpose are central evidence, because official documentation reflects both action and institutional priorities. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 13, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q3098181. None of the 1 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1910, 2012 and 1909.

Critical limits

Institutional narratives can privilege the records that survived while minimizing voices that were never formally collected. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Compare institutional narratives with records created by participants and affected communities. Dates and formal titles are useful anchors, but not substitutes for context.

Best used for
  • Event chronology
  • Institutional context
  • Locating named record creators
Verify next

Contemporary correspondence, government or organizational records, oral histories and cited historical scholarship.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Arkansas Razorbacks”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Arkansas Razorbacks primary sources, Arkansas Razorbacks archive and Arkansas research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Arkansas Razorbacks”?
  2. Which voices are present, absent or mediated by the institution?
  3. What chronology connects this entry to wider political or social change?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from Arkansas Razorbacks” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.