Dive into the Heart of Mizzou Athletics

The graduate transfer’s pick quelled any comeback attempt from UMass at the end of the first half.

Deep concern wasn’t in the building quite yet. But it was perched somewhere close to McGuirk Alumni Stadium.

With Mizzou leading 21-3 towards the end of the first half, UMass was stringing together consecutive positive plays on offense. The drive included a 39-yard run by defensive back Te’Rai Powell on a fake punt that gave the Minutemen new life.

To preface, an 18-point lead is large in any football context. However, these circumstances were different, a combination of two factors that made alarm bells ring louder for the Tigers.

Mizzou’s season leading up to Saturday had been, to many, underwhelming. The sting of a 31-point shellacking to No. 14 Texas A&M the week prior still seemed prevalent; in a game that was to be a test of Mizzou’s legitimacy at a national level, the Tigers fell terribly flat, as the myriad of warning signs flashed in the four games previous showed up in College Station.

Then, there was the present day. Mizzou’s bizarre trip to UMass was ripe for a rebound; the Tigers entered Saturday as almost a 30-point favorite against the 1-5 Minutemen, which is what made the end-of-half march by the home team more intriguing.

After the successful fake punt, a 13-yard run by CJ Hester put UMass at Mizzou’s nine-yard line with 70 seconds remaining in the half. UMass went two yards forwards, then two yards backwards to set up a third-and-nine. Quarterback Taisun Phommachanh dropped back to pass and fired a dart over the middle.

Earlier in the week, Corey Flagg Jr. had this to say about what went wrong defensively against Texas A&M.

“I think it was just a lot of guys…trying to make a play instead of just, including myself, instead of just doing our assignment, doing our job and playing with the defense,” Flagg said.

But what if you could remain within the defense and make a play? With the Minutemen threatening, Flagg baked a cake and ate it, too.

During this past Tuesday’s edition of “Tiger Talk”, linebackers coach DJ Smith inadvertently foreshadowed Flagg running like the wind that whipped all afternoon in Amherst.

“He can really, really run. He’s faster than what his tape shows,” Smith told Mike Kelly. “He’s a very instinctual player.”

While Smith was complimentary of Flagg’s wheels, the graduate transfer took a more self-depreciating route after the game.

“I need to go to speed school,” Flagg said.

Although he couldn’t take the interception all the way to the end zone, the Miami transfer’s hurricane of a turnover put Mizzou at the UMass nine-yard line with nine seconds to go. Although Brady Cook was sacked on the next play, there was still time for Blake Craig to kick a field goal, which he did so successfully to complete a 10-point swing that stomped out any spark of a Minutemen revival.

For a defense that’d experienced lapses in coverage over the past few weeks (including Saturday), Flagg’s shining moment proved all the more valuable. It was Mizzou’s first takeaway since Dreyden Norwood’s interception against Boston College.

The moment was reminiscent of something Flagg’s former UM teammate, current Tennessee Titans linebacker James Williams, told me at the Reese’s Senior Bowl in February when asked about how he overcomes in-game adversity.

“I can’t be 11 people out there trying to make every play,” Williams said. “I’ve just got to do my job and make sure my teammate does his job. We’ll all be successful together.”

It was a celebratory day for not just Corey Flagg, but his brother, Caleb, who forced a fumble on that was recovered by Shemar McNeil in the fourth quarter. Caleb was praised numerous times by players and coaches throughout fall camp, and he recorded his first big play of the 2024 season with Mizzou up big late in the game.

“I told y’all, he’s a dog,” Corey said. “He’s better than me. I’m dead serious.”

Only time will tell if Caleb can surpass his older brother. For now, the two can enjoy their fruitful outings in Amherst before a trip back to Columbia to take on Auburn next Saturday.

Winning is hard, so when it looks easy we should appreciate it.

Yesterday was a boring day of football for the Missouri Tigers.

It was needed.

Winning 45-3 over a fairly hapless UMass team doesn’t wash away the week before, but now for five of the six weeks of football the Tigers have played they’ve gotten the results they needed. Maybe the best part about yesterday was that it was boring.

I watched the game from my couch and chuckled on the second play when Luther Burden took a jet sweep 61 yards for a touchdown. I yawned after a 13 play 80 yard drive to score the Tigers second TD on the day. As they were going up 21-0 I was sipping coffee, Maybe there were angry comments at every slight error, and some general weirdness in the game thread yesterday, but the Tigers were up 24-3 at halftime and barely broke a sweat the rest of the way.

Mizzou got caught on a fake punt, and definitely had some coverage issues, but UMass had 11 drives and gained just 237 yards. Quick math says that’s 21.5 yards per drive. Meanwhile the offense scored on 6 of their first 7 drives and 7 of their first 9 before turning things over the backups. And only one of those was with a short field, ironically enough that’s when they kicked the field goal. That’s an efficient day of football.

With the previous week’s performance hanging over the program, one could foresee a road trip to a place like Amherst to play a team like UMass as a trap. Weird things happen when you travel to play against a team where you’re favored by 30 points. Hell, before the game if you asked me to place a bet, I might’ve taken UMass with the spread. Like many of you, I figured the Tigers would show up looking hung over and win convincingly but only by like 21 points or something.

But they didn’t, they won by 42 points, and that was with a full quarter of the backups failing to score on three drives.

Being boring when you need to be is a good thing. Mizzou was really boring in the first two games. Less so in the next two games, but at least Vanderbilt has proven to be a good win. I do understand the feelings of resentment for the way things went down at Texas A&M. But as I said last week, if there’s a year you can afford a mulligan it’s this one.

Eli Drinkwitz isn’t a perfect coach with a perfect football program. He’s a good coach with a good program. But even the best coaches and best teams have weeks where things get away from you. One of the things I really like about Drink is the 1-0 mentality. All you can do is control how you play one play at time, one series at a time, one game at a time. You can’t control what’s behind you, you can’t control what’s in front of you. You can only control what’s right here in this moment.

I have no idea where this is headed. I’ve watched enough football this year to know it’s nearly impossible to say. Nobody seems to be all that great, well maybe except Texas. The Longhorns have yet to be challenged. Ohio State and Oregon played a tight close game, so they’re probably good. But you don’t have to worry about anyone who isn’t in the SEC until the regular season is over. And the three highest ranked teams after Texas all struggled at home against unranked opponents.

If anything that should be a lesson to Mizzou, and its fans. For the Tigers themselves, anyone can be beaten by anyone and anywhere. Playing at home doesn’t save you. The only thing you can do is go 1-0.

Not everything is ever as bad as it seems. Mizzou is 5-1 with Auburn coming to down for homecoming. It doesn’t matter how you beat them, just beat them. Go 1-0, and then worry about the rest later.

Other SEC Scores:

• Texas (1) 34, Oklahoma (18) 3
• Georgia (5) 34, Mississippi State 24
• Alabama (7) 27, South Carolina 25
• Tennessee (8) 23, Florida 17
• LSU (13) 29, Ole Miss (9) 26
• Vanderbilt 20, Kentucky 13
• #15 Texas A&M – bye
• Arkansas – bye
• Auburn – bye