Sam Pittman addresses pressure on him to turn Arkansas around: 'It'd be kind of hard to have more pressure'

Arkansas and Sam Pittman suffered a brutal loss to Memphis over the weekend. The Razorbacks fell by one point on the road, evening up their record at 2-2 on the season.

The pressure is on in Fayetteville, as Pittman went into the 2025 campaign on the hot seat. Now, it doesn’t seem like his chair is going to cool off at all, barring a miraculous turnaround.

Regardless, he’s still the leader of the program, and there’s a game this weekend at home against Notre Dame. A win could change everything, and that’s led to immense pressure on Pittman heading into the matchup against the Fighting Irish.

“It’d be kind of hard to have more pressure,” Pittman told the media. “I mean, the pressure you put on yourself is obviously a lot, because you want to do well for a lot of reasons. But I’ve kind of had this same type of pressure for, I don’t know, three years now. It seems like 40, but it’s been about three.

“We have an opportunity. The only way we can get people who don’t believe in us to start having more positive thoughts about our program is to win ballgames — that’s the bottom line. You can say whatever you want, do whatever you want, but at the end of the day, it’s, ‘What’s the score?’ That’s what changes people’s perception.

“We’ve got a great opportunity here. As we all know, we could be 4–0 but we’re not, we’re 2–2. I only say that because if we were 4–0, I think everyone in here would be talking about our chances against Notre Dame, and our football team would feel the same way.

“We’ve got to rally around this week, and we will. But to answer your question — probably not any more pressure than normal.”

All told, it’s been a lack of consistency that’s killed Arkansas this season. Pittman previously said it starts with him and they have to look inward to find solutions. At times, they’ve looked like one of the best teams in the nation. However, they’ve also blown two huge games over the last couple of weeks. It’s a polarizing program.

The pressure is on for a good reason, as Pittman is now 32-33 at Arkansas since taking over as head coach in 2020. While there’s been three bowl game victories, Pittman has not topped nine wins in a season (2021). Since that year, he’s just 23-29.

Time will tell if Pittman can guide Arkansas to a landmark win over reigning national runner-up Notre Dame. Such a victory would arguably be his biggest yet with the Razorbacks — and cool his seat in the process. Kickoff is set for Saturday at 12:00 p.m. ET inside Razorback Stadium.