Charlotte at Arkansas: December 28th, 2011

Via CBS Sports’ Jeff Goodman, and eventually the release of their non-conference schedule, today it was learned that the Niners will be facing Arkansas on December 28th, one of the final pieces in the puzzle of our 2011-12 schedule. Based on one of the Razorbacks’ recent scheduling ads, it’s not outrageous to speculate that this is the first game of a  home and home series.

Arkansas Razorbacks–December 20,26 27, or 28. Need 1 game. Prefer home and home series.

This will be the first match-up in men’s  basketball between the 49ers and the Razorbacks, although the two baseball squads met in the 2011 NCAA Tournament. Arkansas’ new Head Coach, Mike Anderson, is familiar with Charlotte, as he was the coach of UAB while both schools were members of Conference USA. More familiar to The Niner Nation would be Associate Head Coach Melvin Watkins, who was part of the 1977 Final Four team, as well as taking over Head Coach at Charlotte after Jeff Mullins’ retirement. Both of his seasons as head coach resulted NCAA Tournament appearences(’97, ’98) before leaving for everybody’s favorite domino, Texas A&M. This will be Coach Watkins first game against Charlotte since leaving the program in 1998.

Known Schedule to Date:

11/11 NC CENTRAL
11/18ish at Lamar
11/22  EAST TENNESSEE STATE
11/26 at Wright State
12/3 at East Carolina
12/10 DAVIDSON
12/19 COPPIN STATE
12/22 MIAMI(FL)
12/28 at Arkansas
12/31 at Memphis
TBA at Radford
TBA TBA

While the date for the Radford game is still an unknown, from gaps in our schedule, and known Radford dates, we expect the game to come in between the East Carolina and Davidson games. Those subscribed to Rivals.com’s Niner Report know about another supposed opponent.