Arkansas leaves Virginia Tech off Coaches Poll ballot, gets Hokies in Belk Bowl

Well, that was momentarily awkward.

Hours after Arkansas mysteriously excluded Virginia Tech from its final Coaches Poll ballot of the year, Bret Bielema's Razorbacks drew those very Hokies as opponents in the Belk Bowl.

The perceived disrespect could've led to some bad blood between the two programs in the lead-up to the game, but Arkansas explained the gaffe in a statement Sunday evening:

When submitting Head Football Coach Bret Bielema's top 25 poll this morning, our Communications Director inadvertently omitted Virginia Tech from Coach Bielema's ballot. After watching last night's ACC Championship Game, Coach Bielema indicated he wanted to move Virginia Tech up from its No. 17 position in the poll he submitted last week into the top 15 this week. Neither our Communications Director or Coach Bielema were aware of the oversight until tonight's press conference.

Those sentences could lead some to believe that head coaches are way too busy to watch every game played by every team in order to fill out an informed ballot each week that, which ultimately results in nothing meaningful, but Arkansas said that's not the case:

Coach Bielema takes great pride in being part of the coaches' poll and thoroughly goes over the national results every week before developing his vote. The Arkansas Razorbacks sincerely apologize to the Virginia Tech football program and the coaches' poll for the mistake in submitting that vote this week.

Virginia Tech accepted the apology, so consider the issue squashed.

The Hokies finished at No. 19 in the Coaches Poll, No. 18 in the AP Poll, and No. 22 in the College Football Playoff rankings.