Arkansas Sports 360 - ArkansasSports360.com

2/10/2012 at 3:18pm

Image by Eric Howerton

Former Arkansas coach Nolan Richardson is the subject of an upcoming ESPN documentary. Razorback fans will get a sneak peek on Feb. 11.

Postgame footage of a 1994 Arkansas game at Rupp Arena is featured just past the halfway mark of the upcoming ESPN documentary “40 Minutes of Hell.” That joyous locker room scene from a victory at Kentucky is explained as a turning point in the season that brought the school its only basketball national championship.

Essentially that game, that celebration, was a precursor to the one that came later that season and included a parade through the streets of Fayetteville. Footage from the parade and post-championship visit to the White House also make the documentary.

While those celebratory moments are plentiful in the film, they are far from the only ones captured in ESPN’s latest SEC "Storied" offering. Filmmakers explore the triumph Richardson had at Arkansas but also delve into his ugly parting with the school and eventual reuniting with the Razorbacks.

“It ain’t no beautiful picture,” Richardson told me when we chatted earlier this week. “[ESPN] did a great job with it, but I’m not sure it’s a rah-rah kind of tape.”

Richardson is right about that. Partially.

What viewers will find on ESPNU at 8 p.m. Saturday isn’t 40 minutes of only the good times. While the film highlights the national success and ends on the positive note of longtime Richardson assistant Mike Anderson being hired at Fayetteville, it does explore the more tumultuous parts of Richardson’s time at Arkansas and his dismissal in 2002.

Simply put, it's an accurate portrayal of Richardson.

Richardson’s entire life — from his upbringing in Jim Crow-era El Paso, Texas, to his coaching stints in junior college and Tulsa to the death of his daughter and eventual success at Arkansas — was full of what narrator Charles Dutton describes as a “beautiful system of anger.”

Honestly, there are some uncomfortable moments in the documentary, which includes interviews with Richardson, former players, biographer Rus Bradburd and President Bill Clinton. It will be interesting to see how fans at Bud Walton Arena react when watching the film’s debut following Saturday’s 12:30 p.m. Arkansas-South Carolina game. (Arkansas officials have watched the film and are just fine with it. They're treating it as a special event and bringing in former players, SEC officials and others for the deubut.)

Richardson's final press conference before he was fired isn't omitted. Richardson, addressing a room of about 10 Razorback beat reporters, unleashed years of frustration in one surreal burst that included the following:

”See, my great-great-grandfather came over on the ship, I didn’t. And I don’t think you understand what I’m saying. My great-great-grandfather came over on the ship. Not Nolan Richardson.

”I did not come over on that ship, so I expect to be treated a little bit different. Because I know for a fact that I do not play on the same level as the other coaches around this school play on.”

Still, those weren’t the quotes that most struck a nerve with me. Make no mistake those words from Richardson’s final press conference are still difficult to hear and could potentially reopen some wounds that seem to have healed.

Perhaps even more troubling than that footage from a decade ago is a recent explanation of Richardson’s firing offered by former Arkansas chancellor John White. Former athletic director Frank Broyles (who isn’t part of the film) and White were responsible for Richardson’s dismissal. White oversaw the UA (in title, the real power belonged to Broyles at the time) when Richardson was fired.

White tells filmmakers that he did Richardson a favor by firing him. He also explains that Richardson — a racial pioneer in coaching — wasn’t a good enough selling point for the UA.

“It was important for me that he send the message that he was happy at the University of Arkansas,” White said. “Because people all over the state – particularly African-Americans in this state – were watching Coach Richardson and they were making decisions about whether their sons and daughters should come to the University of Arkansas to go to school.”

That gives you an idea of how much the relationship between Richardson and school officials was allowed to deteriorate. Somehow, a man that was a catalyst for racial change throughout his life — a man who endured a bomb threat and slurs from his own fans before leading the basketball program to its only national title — wasn’t seen as a good example.

Richardson, who never could seem to get comfortable with his success because of the inequality he saw in his life and the lives of others, was an asset the former powers-that-be couldn’t figure out how to use to their advantage. That’s a stark contrast to the way Richardson has been handled by current chancellor Dave Gearhart and athletic director Jeff Long.

Arkansas, despite the ugly parting of ways a decade ago, has gone out of its way to rekindle the relationship with Richardson during the past three years. The work to bring the school and coach back together is captured in the film, which mentions the 15-year celebration of the 1994 national title team in 2009 as a turning point for Arkansas, its Hall of Fame coach and former players.

ESPN does a fantastic job of explaining how the same attributes that led Richardson to success also led to his dismissal. Richardson, who never left town after being fired, challenged convention. He bucked stereotypes. And, as the film reminds us, he made people really uncomfortable at times.

Ultimately, though, his willingness to fight proved to be — and remains — an asset to the University of Arkansas.

Email: cbahn@abpg.com. Follow Chris on Twitter @cbahn.

Tagged: President Bill Clinton, Nolan Richardson, Charles Dutton, Bud Walton Arena, ESPNU, ESPN, Jeff Long, Dave Gearhart, John White, Arkansas Razorbacks