Pourover: Everything you needed it to be

The beginning of a new college football season throughout the country brings with it the hope of what could be. Missouri fans know, as much as anyo...

Summarized by AI ⓘ

What is the story about?

The beginning of a new college football season throughout the country brings with it the hope of what could be.

Missouri fans know, as much as anyone, the different ways a season can unfold. We’ve been in the stands for every kind of season under the sun. Great ones, poor ones, many in between.

And for experienced eyes, when the season opening opponent is an FCS school, you learn to temper your expectations. The base expectation is to win big and see a lot of snaps for your backups. This year we were

hoping to see a semblance of a Quarterback battle, but more than anything you wanted to see a comfortable win. Last season Mizzou did the same thing, they opened against FCS Murray State and won 51-0. Two years ago they opened with FCS South Dakota and won 35-10.

The scheduling strategy is a solid one, if you ask me. If you’re going to play one FCS opponent you should play them early and workout some kinks when you team is still an unfinished product. Mizzou has faced at least one FCS team every year since 2005 (not including the 2020 season where they only played SEC teams).

If you’re Eli Drinkwitz you should be pleased with the way your team played.

Obviously the caveat of losing Blake Craig and Sam Horn to injury stinks to high heaven, but at least you got a really positive performance from Beau Pribula. He looked like the starter, and if Horn’s untimely injury did anything, it allowed the offense to reset themselves at halftime, and come out with a different and more physical approach. Particularly since the early parts of the 1st half saw some questionable play from this newly settled offensive line.

Things you wanted to see: Beau Pribula throw the ball well.

Things you saw: Pribula go 23-28 for 2 TDs and 0 INTs. You also saw him attempt several deep balls with mixed results, but overall the accuracy looked good on the short and intermediate throws.

Things you wanted to see: Ahmad Hardy make like difficult on defenders at the second level.

Things you saw: Hardy go 10 carries for 100 yards and a TD. It took him a few carries to get going but once he got it going things got ugly for the Central Arkansas defense.

Things you wanted to see: The new offensive line dominate.

Things you saw: A mixed bag. 5.76 yards per carry is good, three tackles for loss isn’t awful. But there were some obvious issues in the early going. Cayden Green’s pre-season All American status looked shaky as he whiffed on a few blocks in the first half, but he and the rest of the line settled in and played great after halftime. Hopefully the early bumps were the adjustment, and the later more fluid play is where things are going to end up.

Things you wanted to see: The defense look stout.

Things you saw: The defense was stout.

Yes Central Arkansas scored, but it was in the last minute and against a LOT of Missouri freshmen. Central Arkansas had 39 yards on 14 plays in the 1st quarter, which is just 2.8 yards per play. The second quarter saw 9 plays for 23 yards, or 2.5 per play. That’s a first half of 62 yards and just 2.7 yards per play. As the subs filtered in the yards loosened, but they still only had 3.2 yards per play through three quarters.

Even the youngsters had bright spots. No matter where you looked there was the evidence you needed to feel the way you wanted to feel. Think Mizzou is going to be average? You can point to the offensive line’s first half and their struggles to keep Pribula clean as evidence. Think they’re going to be good? Yeah they figured it out and got things rolling.

There’s a long season ahead, and after watching a fair amount of SEC teams play football the last few days, I think it’s safe to say Mizzou is at least competitive. There isn’t anything I saw on Thursday, or Friday, or Saturday to convince me Missouri can’t contend for a playoff spot if they get a few breaks to go their way.

The first up on their list of to-do’s? BTHO of kU.