No. 12 Arkansas Basketball Already Looks Like a Big-Season Team
A Hall of Fame coach, a starting five with a real job, and a bench that can take the job. The Razorbacks opened 2026-27 by running Arkansas-Pine Bluff out of Bud Walton Arena, 106-61.
The preseason is over, and it did not waste anybody’s time.
No. 12 Arkansas spent the last week of October beating a ranked Gonzaga team and then Memphis inside Bud Walton Arena. On Tuesday night the games started counting. The Razorbacks opened the 2026-27 season with a 106-61 win over Arkansas-Pine Bluff, the first meeting between the programs, and a 25-0 run that started right after the Golden Lions scored the first basket. UAPB did not get the ball through the net again until the 11:28 mark of the first half. By then the night had a shape.
Twelve of the 13 Hogs who played scored. The freshmen accounted for 65 of the 106 points. Jeremiah Wilkinson, the Georgia transfer, led everybody with 23. Freshman point guard Jordan Smith Jr. added 20 in his college debut. This was not a one-man Razorbacks team. It was the roster Calipari has been talking about since the summer, out loud, in front of the home crowd.
| FINAL · Bud Walton Arena · Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2026 | |
|---|---|
| ARKANSAS-PINE BLUFF | 61 |
| NO. 12 ARKANSAS | 106 |
Arkansas shot 35 of 64 (54.7 percent), made 6 of 18 threes, and went 30 of 42 at the line. The Hogs finished with 43 rebounds (17 offensive), 19 assists, 16 steals and 7 blocks, against 11 turnovers. UAPB shot 38.9 percent and committed the kind of live-ball mistakes a pressing Arkansas team is built to turn into dunks. The lead was 19 at halftime, 47-28, and it never got interesting again. A 23-3 run in the second half, sparked by back-to-back dunks from Miikka Muurinen and Smith, pushed the margin into blowout territory.
This is Year 3 for John Calipari in Fayetteville. He does not have a Hall of Fame résumé waiting on a committee. He has been in the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame since 2015. He took the Razorbacks to the Sweet 16 in each of his first two seasons. Last year’s group went 28-9, 13-5 in the SEC, and scored 90.2 points a game, second in the country. The same team allowed 81 points a game, a defensive number that sat near the bottom of Division I. The roster turned over. The standard did not. What showed up Tuesday is the thing this staff has been building: a starting five with a job, and a bench deep enough to keep the job if somebody blinks.
The starting five
Calipari opened with the same five the preseason projections had circled for weeks: Smith, Wilkinson, Billy Richmond III, Muurinen and Cooper Bowser. All five scored. None of them played more than 28 minutes. That is the detail that matters more than the score. He did not have to grind his starters to beat a team he was supposed to beat.
| Starter | No. | Line vs. UAPB |
|---|---|---|
| Jordan Smith Jr. · PG | 23 | 28 min, 20 pts, 7-11 FG, 6-10 FT, 4 reb, 2 ast, 3 stl |
| Jeremiah Wilkinson · SG | 5 | 21 min, 23 pts, 7-11 FG, 4-7 3PT, 6 reb, 3 ast, 5 stl |
| Billy Richmond III · SF | 24 | 19 min, 8 pts, 4-7 FG, 2 reb, 2 ast, 1 stl, 2 blk |
| Miikka Muurinen · PF | 3 | 18 min, 10 pts, 3-9 FG, 4 reb, 2 ast, 2 stl |
| Cooper Bowser · C | 21 | 16 min, 8 pts, 4-4 FG, 7 reb, 1 ast, 1 stl, 1 blk |
Box score via ESPN, Arkansas 106, Arkansas-Pine Bluff 61, Nov. 3, 2026. Personal rebounds; the team total was 43 including team boards.
Jordan Smith Jr., point guard
NO. 23 · 6-2, 205 · FRESHMAN · PAUL VI · GATORADE NATIONAL PLAYER OF THE YEAR
Smith is the headliner of the nation’s No. 1 recruiting class and the best draft prospect on this roster. CBS Sports had him No. 3 in its way-too-early 2027 mock and in the mix to go No. 1. He is not Darius Acuff Jr., who just opened the NBA season with the Sacramento Kings, and he does not have to be on night one. He does have to run the team.
He did. Twenty points on 7-of-11 shooting, 6-of-10 at the line, four rebounds, two assists and three steals in 28 minutes. He did not take a three. The rim was the plan, and the rim cooperated. Against Memphis in the exhibition he had 17 on 7-of-11. The useful counterexample is still on tape: an 0-for-9 night against Gonzaga, when the bench had to carry a stretch without him. Freshmen have those nights. The response, 20 in the opener, is the part Fayetteville will remember. If he can add a reliable jumper to the burst and the defense, this offense has a lead guard for March, not just for November.
Jeremiah Wilkinson, shooting guard
NO. 5 · 6-1, 185 · JUNIOR · CAL, THEN GEORGIA, NOW ARKANSAS
Wilkinson is the grown scorer in a backcourt full of freshmen. He averaged 17.4 points at Georgia and shot 35.7 percent from three on 7.1 attempts a game. Arkansas is his third school in three seasons. The portal ranking that brought him here, No. 33 on 247Sports, undersold the way he fits this roster: a guard who can shoot it, guard it, and keep a young offense from drifting.
Tuesday was the announcement. Twenty-three points, 7-of-11 from the floor, 4-of-7 from three, six rebounds, three assists, five steals and a block in 21 minutes. Nine of those points, all threes, came during the 25-0 run. When the shot clock is dying in January, his is the first hand that should go up.
Billy Richmond III, wing
NO. 24 · 6-7, 205 · JUNIOR · MEMPHIS, TENN. · PRESEASON ALL-SEC (THIRD TEAM, MEDIA)
Richmond is the only significant holdover from last year’s rotation, and he is the reason this roster is not entirely a freshman experiment. He averaged 11.2 points and 4.3 rebounds, started 19 of 37 games, and was one of the better defenders in the SEC. He tested the NBA Draft, heard an early-second-round projection, and came back. The league’s media answered by putting him on the preseason All-SEC third team.
The opener was a glue night. Eight points on 4-of-7, two assists, a steal and two blocks in 19 minutes, plus a dunk off a JJ Andrews hustle play. The exhibitions were louder. He scored 17 against Gonzaga and then went 7-of-7 for 17 against Memphis, with a team-best plus-27, two threes, three assists and two blocks. He is not going to be the leading scorer. He is the athlete who has already played an SEC Saturday in this building. If the jumper becomes something opponents have to honor, the ceiling of this team moves with it.
“Twelve Hogs scored. The freshmen put up 65 of the 106. That is not a superstar night. That is a roster.”
The Hog Call, off the Nov. 3 box score
Miikka Muurinen, forward
NO. 3 · LISTED 7-0, 215 · FRESHMAN · FIVE-STAR · PARTIZAN (SERBIA)
Muurinen spent the last two seasons with Partizan and arrived as one of the most coveted bigs in the class. He is listed at 7-foot and 215 pounds, and he plays more like a mismatch than a back-to-the-basket center. He can face up. He can run. Calipari did not wait to start him. Smith and Muurinen were the top two recruits in an eight-man freshman class, and both were in the opening lineup.
The college debut: 10 points, four rebounds, two assists and two steals in 18 minutes, with a dunk that helped trigger the 23-3 second-half run. He already has a double-double on the preseason sheet, 10 points and 12 rebounds against Memphis. The shot is still settling. He was 3-of-9 against UAPB and 0-of-2 from three. The size and the motor are not settling. They are already good enough to start.
Cooper Bowser, center
NO. 21 · 6-11 · SENIOR · FURMAN TRANSFER · 59 COLLEGE STARTS
Bowser is the adult in a frontcourt that is otherwise brand new. After three seasons at Furman he averaged 13.8 points, 5.9 rebounds and 1.2 blocks, then transferred into the one spot Arkansas could not fill with a freshman and a prayer. Calipari has talked about him becoming “Mr. Dependable,” the big who does the quiet work when the five-stars are figuring out the SEC.
The opener was exactly that. Eight points on 4-of-4 shooting, seven rebounds, an assist, a steal and a block in 16 minutes. The free throws, 0-of-3, are the note in the margin. Against Gonzaga he had nine points, 10 rebounds and a team-best plus-12. Last year’s Arkansas team sometimes had to slide a wing to the four when the frontcourt got thin. Bowser, Muurinen and the bench bigs are why that sentence should be retired.
The bench is not a courtesy
This is the difference from some of the thinner Arkansas rotations of the last two years. In October, Calipari said he expected to play 10 or 11 available Hogs against Gonzaga because, for once, he had more than five or six he trusted. Eight players averaged at least 17 minutes across the two exhibitions; Toure was a tick under. The opener backed the talk up. The second unit did not come in to clap and stand in the corner.
| Key bench | No. | Line vs. UAPB |
|---|---|---|
| Abdou Toure · wing | 1 | 20 min, 12 pts, 4-7 FG, 4-4 FT, 3 reb, 2 ast |
| JJ Andrews · wing | 7 | 20 min, 4 pts, 3 reb, 2 ast, 2 stl, 1 blk |
| Davion Thompson · guard | 9 | 19 min, 7 pts, 1-3 3PT, 4 ast, 2 stl |
| Maper Maker · forward | 8 | 23 min, 6 pts, 1-1 FG, 4-4 FT, 8 reb, 2 blk |
| Caleb Ourigou · center | 0 | 9 min, 3 pts, 0-1 FG, 3-4 FT |
Abdou Toure
NO. 1 · 6-5, ABOUT 200 · FRESHMAN WING · TOP-20 RECRUIT IN THE 2026 CLASS
Toure was the first real answer off the bench, and he scored like a starter. Twelve points on 4-of-7, a clean 4-of-4 at the line, three rebounds and two assists in 20 minutes, with zero turnovers. He is a five-star wing, No. 16 overall in the 247Sports class rankings in the August roster breakdowns, and the kind of athlete who can guard across the perimeter when Richmond sits. In the Gonzaga exhibition, the Thompson-Toure-Andrews group sparked a run of consecutive stops that flipped a ranked opponent. Tuesday, Toure did not need a run. He just scored.
JJ Andrews
NO. 7 · 6-6, 225 · FRESHMAN · LITTLE ROCK CHRISTIAN ACADEMY · TOP-15 RECRUIT
Andrews is the Arkansas kid in a rotation full of national names, and he plays like he knows the building. The opener line was modest: four points, three rebounds, two assists, two steals and a block in 20 minutes. The preseason line was not. He had 10 points and nine rebounds against Gonzaga and has been the effort player Calipari does not love taking off the floor. A 6-6, 225-pound wing who rebounds like a four gives this team a physical change of pace when Wilkinson or Richmond needs a blow. Little Rock to Bud Walton is a short drive. The minutes should not be.
Davion Thompson
NO. 9 · 6-2, 180 · FRESHMAN GUARD · RECLASSIFIED FROM 2027 · LINK ACADEMY
Thompson is 17. He should still be a high school senior. He reclassified, finished as a top-40 prospect in the 2026 cycle after ranking as a top-25 player in 2027, and then played like the backup point guard of a ranked team. He scored 12 against Gonzaga, including the step-back three from the top of the key that pushed a one-possession game to five in the final minute. He scored 13 against Memphis. Against UAPB he had seven points, four assists and two steals in 19 minutes, and he hit one of the team’s six threes. When Smith sits, the offense does not have to change philosophy. That is rare for a freshman backup, and it is why the backcourt minutes can stay honest all winter.
“Maper gives everything he can. I’m comfortable playing him at the 5 and the 4.”
John Calipari, on freshman forward Maper Maker, during the preseason
Maper Maker
NO. 8 · ABOUT 7-0 · FRESHMAN FORWARD · WINGSPAN NEAR 7-FOOT-7
Maker was the surprise of October, and Tuesday said the surprise is sticking. Six points on his only field-goal attempt, 4-of-4 at the line, eight rebounds and two blocks in 23 minutes. That is more run than several starters got. The wingspan has been reported near 7-foot-7, and the stat line is the proof. He can protect the rim behind Bowser and he can rebound next to Muurinen. Against Memphis he had seven points and five rebounds in a similar role. A coach who says out loud that he will play a freshman at both the four and the five is not saving a uniform. He is using one.
Caleb Ourigou, and the rest of the roster
NO. 0 · 6-11, 240 · FRESHMAN · OVERTIME ELITE · NO. 85 IN THE 2026 CYCLE, PER 247SPORTS
Ourigou is the developmental center, not the story of the night. Three points in nine minutes, 3-of-4 at the line, and a body that can eventually bully people on the block. Calipari has been plain that the role will grow on Ourigou’s timeline, not on a message-board timeline. Ilia Frolov, the 7-foot freshman who came out of Real Madrid’s system, checked in for four minutes and hit a three. Ayden Kelley and Amere Brown played the last minute. Isaiah Sealy is out for the season, and Paulo Semedo, who redshirted last year, has yet to play. The rotation that actually played was already 10 deep, and 12 of the 13 who got in the game scored. That is the sentence.
The building, the league, and a rude November
Arkansas did not sneak into this season. The Razorbacks were No. 12 in the preseason AP poll and No. 13 in the USA Today coaches poll, and the SEC’s media picked them third. In that same AP poll, Florida was No. 1, Texas No. 7, Tennessee No. 8, Alabama No. 20, Kentucky No. 23 and Vanderbilt No. 24. That is the neighborhood. The No. 1 recruiting class in the country is why the ranking survived a roster that returned one real starter.
The building has been ready longer than the poll. Gonzaga and Memphis both came to Bud Walton and left with losses, 76-72 and 93-81, in front of the kind of November crowd that usually waits until conference play. Arkansas also kept its long home-opener winning streak going. The fans are not waiting to see if this team is worth the drive. They have already decided.
The league path is just as real. Arkansas athletics counted 11 former Razorbacks on NBA opening-day rosters this fall, a list that includes Acuff with the Kings, Anthony Black, Trevon Brazile, Daniel Gafford, Isaiah Joe and Moses Moody. Calipari’s own tree — Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Anthony Davis, Tyrese Maxey, De’Aaron Fox, and a long line after them — is why five-stars keep taking the call. Players come to Fayetteville because the next step has names on it. Fans fill Bud Walton because the nights have a pulse. A Hall of Fame coach in the middle of that is not a marketing line. It is the actual reason the roster looks like this.
The honest version is that UAPB was the first step, not the test. Calipari scheduled a November that will tell the truth early. Times below are Central, from the published 2026-27 schedule.
| Date | Opponent | Where it matters |
|---|---|---|
| Sun, Nov. 8 | No. 9 Virginia | Capital One Arena, Washington, noon, ESPN |
| Wed, Nov. 11 | Robert Morris | Bud Walton Arena, 7 p.m. |
| Fri, Nov. 13 | Central Arkansas | Bud Walton Arena, 7 p.m. |
| Tue, Nov. 17 | Indiana | Madison Square Garden, 6:30 p.m., Peacock |
| Thu, Nov. 26 | No. 6 Michigan State | Little Caesars Arena, Detroit, 3:30 p.m., CBS |
| Tue, Dec. 1 | North Carolina | Dean E. Smith Center, 6:30 p.m., ESPN |
| Sat, Dec. 19 | No. 5 Arizona | Mortgage Matchup Center, Phoenix, 5:30 p.m., ESPN |
Opponent rankings as listed on national schedule boards the morning of Nov. 4, 2026. Polls move. Tip times can move with them. Conference play opens Jan. 2 against Missouri at Bud Walton.
Last year’s Hogs lost a close one at Michigan State. Virginia, Carolina and Arizona are not exhibitions, and neither is a Tuesday in the SEC once it starts. The defensive number from a year ago — 81 points a game, around 337th nationally — is the hole this roster was assembled to fill. Sixteen steals and seven blocks against UAPB are a nice opening argument. They are not proof. Length helps. Richmond’s defense helps. Maker’s wingspan helps. Bowser’s 59 college starts help. None of that travels automatically to Capital One Arena on Sunday.
The three-point line is the other tell. Arkansas made only 6 of 18 on Tuesday. Wilkinson carried that number. Smith did not take one. A team this long and this fast can win in early November without living from deep. It will not beat this nonconference slate, and it will not beat the top of the SEC in March, if the jumper stays optional. The exhibitions already hinted at the same split personality: good enough to rally from 10 down against Gonzaga, not yet a machine from the arc.
Where this can go
Call it early. Call it out loud anyway.
The coach is already a Hall of Famer, two Sweet 16s into his Arkansas tenure, with a third season that opened 1-0 and ranked. The starting five has a national high school player of the year, a proven SEC scorer, a returning All-SEC-caliber wing, a five-star stretch big and a 6-11 veteran who has started 59 college games. The bench has three more high-major freshmen who just played like they belong, plus a 7-footer who rebounded like a starter. The building is full. The program is still sending players to the league. Everybody around this team, from the recruits still visiting to the people standing on the baseline in cardinal, is acting like the season is going to be worth the trouble.
That is not a Final Four promise. Arkansas has not been to one since 1995, and nobody in this locker room gets credit for a banner that is not hanging yet. It is a better hand than the Razorbacks have held in a long time, and it is already on the board at 1-0. Sunday in Washington is the first time anyone gets to find out whether the hand is real.
Woo Pig. See you at noon.
FAQ
Who starts for Arkansas basketball in 2026-27?
Against UAPB on Nov. 3, 2026, John Calipari started Jordan Smith Jr., Jeremiah Wilkinson, Billy Richmond III, Miikka Muurinen and Cooper Bowser.
Is John Calipari a Hall of Famer?
Yes. Calipari was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 2015. The 2026-27 season is his third at Arkansas.
What was the score of Arkansas vs. UAPB?
No. 12 Arkansas beat Arkansas-Pine Bluff 106-61 on Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2026, at Bud Walton Arena.
Who are the key Arkansas bench players?
Abdou Toure, JJ Andrews, Davion Thompson, Maper Maker and Caleb Ourigou all played meaningful minutes in the opener.