Arkansas receivers coach Kris Cinkovich has one of the best corps of receivers in the nation. Cinkovich, most recently the receivers coach at UNLV, enters his first year with the Razorbacks in a situation that assistant coaches across the nation must envy.

Back at his disposal are Greg Childs, Joe Adams, Jarius Wright and Cobi Hamilton. They’re viewed by many as some of the best receivers in the nation. Phil Steele ranks Arkansas’ receiver corps No. 1 in the nation. They’re masters of chewing up yards after the catch, and the four are more than capable of big plays as we saw last year when Ryan Mallett broke or tied 16 school records through the air.

Take, for example, Childs. (Hat tip to Chris Low of ESPN.com for providing these stats) The junior led all SEC receivers in conference games with touchdown catches (six), receiving yards (737) and yards per catch (23) last season. He also was tops nationally in receiving yards (402) against teams ranked in the Top 25 and led the SEC in catches of 25 yards or more with 13 and catches in the fourth quarter (16).

But Childs did not make the media and coaches’ all-SEC teams this pre-season. In fact, no Arkansas receiver was named to the pre-season teams.

I caught up with Cinkovich on Thursday and asked him about his receiving corps as he gets ready for his first season at Arkansas. The audio and transcript of our discussion is below.

AUDIO

Kris Cinkovich interview

TRANSCRIPT

First off, what kind of things have you been hearing from the kids when you see them in the hallways concerning the summer workouts?

I think they have the same high expectations that we as a staff have and all the Razorback Nation has, and I think they have high demands of themselves. We’re probably not going to accept anything less than that.

Being the first year in the job, I’m sure you have to be pretty happy to have the group you’ve got. A lot of people consider it one of the most talented in the nation. What’s your take on that?

We’ve got stuff every day we can work on to get better. And liek I tell them every day, we’re going to get better or worse and our goal has got to be get up and get better each day. I take pride in having great receiver groups and I think they feel slighted from talking to a couple of them by the pre-season coaches’ poll. You and I know that didn’t necessarily matter — it’s the postseason. But whatever motivating factor seeps into their mind that will make them be better, I’m all for it.

What was your take on it? When you first heard it, were you just like ‘Wow’ or did you just go, ‘Well, we’ve got a lot of guys and maybe it’s hard to pick one out of the four or five?’

It could be. We pride ourselves on having a great unit comprised of great players. I looked at it in the paper one morning, and I was probably a little bit surprised but I knew, and Coach Petrino said the same thing, this should be a heck of a motivator if we have any pride about us.

Having Ryan Mallett back out there next week and he’s expected to be back to full speed, I’m sure the guys are looking forward to catching balls from him because it’s a different thing catching balls from Brandon Mitchell or Tyler Wilson, and they’re both great quarterbacks, but it’s a little bit different getting them from Ryan Mallett.

No question. Ryan really broke that foot about a month after I got here, so I really haven’t been able to — besides watching the great work on film that he’s done — see him. So I know I’m excited and I know the receivers are too. The thing Ryan brings is, he’s such a great leader and our players gravitate to him. He’s got those qualities that you really, really like. He’s a tremendous leader. He’ll benefit us that way too.

The depth chart on offense is obviously stacked, but there are newcomers coming in. Do you think there is anybody in there that could make an impact, get some playing time at least in your area and the players you coach?

I do. We felt, coming out of spring, that we needed more depth in our position — more quality depth with great players. I think somebody in that group is going to do it, and we’re hearing great things about all four of them. I’m really excited about, at least initially, what we’ve seen from this recruiting class of receivers. We expect them, and they probably expect, to press to play. At least a couple of them, I would think.

I don’t want to put anybody above the other, but what kind of things have you heard specifically about a couple of the guys?

I’m not going to probably peg guys quite yet, but we’re hearing some good things. They’ve all had good days. Some of them have had a whole bunch of good days out there throwing and catching, and that’s what the reports tell us.

D.J. Williams was telling me at media days down in Hoover that, at one point during the voluntary workouts, (Julian) Horton caught a one-handed ball. He didn’t sprint up field. He just stopped and he said Ryan Mallett was on a scooter and started pushing one-legged to get up to him and go after that. What does that mean to you? As far as having a coach on the field when you can’t have coaches on the field.

It points to the high standard of excellence in our program, because everybody knows when you catch the ball or run the ball at running back, you burst down the football field. Yeah, and that’s what you really hope you get in your program in the summertime, when the players really have to govern themselves. You have leaders that will enforce just like a coach would do. And when you get that, and the best players are the hardest workers and the best leaders, you might have something special.

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— Brandon Marcello