Arkansas Tech University is picked to finish in the top half of the Great American Conference during the 2016 football season.
The Wonder Boys are sixth in a preseason poll of league head coaches released by the GAC office on Thursday, Aug. 4.
Defending GAC champion Henderson State University is favored to successfully defend its title in 2016. The Reddies received 10 first-place votes and a total of 120 points in the preseason poll.
Harding University (2nd, 100 points), Ouachita Baptist University (3rd, 91 points), Southwestern Oklahoma State University (4th, 88 points), Southern Arkansas University (5th, 82 points) and Arkansas Tech (6th, 79 points) complete the the top half of the poll.
Rounding out the coaches’ predictions are East Central University (7th, 65 points), Southeastern Oklahoma State University (8th, 63 points), Northwestern Oklahoma State University (9th, 33 points), Oklahoma Baptist University (10th, 32 points), the University of Arkansas-Monticello (11th, 28 points) and Southern Nazarene University (12th, 11 points).
Arkansas Tech was 9-3 overall and 8-3 in GAC play during the 2015 season. The Wonder Boys finished tied for second in the GAC standings and won the 2015 C.H.A.M.P.S. Heart of Texas Bowl.
Tech reached the nine-win plateau in a season for just the 10th time in the 101-season history of its football program. The Wonder Boys also won nine or more games in 1946, 1949, 1960, 1964, 1968, 1971, 1999, 2004 and 2009.
Raymond Monica joined John Tucker, Raymond Burnett, Marvin “Shorty” Salmon, Don Dempsey and Steve Mullins as the only Arkansas Tech head football coaches to lead the Wonder Boys to nine or more wins in a season.
Monica is back for his fourth season as Tech’s head coach in 2016.
The Wonder Boys will begin their 102nd football season by hosting Southern Nazarene for a 7 p.m. GAC contest at Thone Stadium at Buerkle Field in Russellville on Thursday, Sept. 1.
