FAYETTEVILLE — For five seasons at Nebraska and for his first 11 seasons at Arkansas, Dave Van Horn had little trouble retaining his assistant coaches.
His Cornhuskers full-time staff never changed in five seasons from 1998-2002. In his first decade at Arkansas, Van Horn had to make only one new hire, replacing hitting coach Matt Deggs with Todd Butler following the 2005 season when Deggs left for an assistant job at Texas A&M.
But since 2013 the two full-time assistant jobs at Arkansas have seemed like revolving doors. Butler was hired as head coach at Wichita State in 2013 and replaced by Tony Vitello, who was hired as head coach at Tennessee in 2017.