There are no moral victories in major college sports and yet the Missouri Tigers should leave Athens, Georgia feeling pretty good about itself even after being eliminated from SEC East contention following a 30-21 loss to the #1 Bulldogs. It’s the second year in a row that the Tigers took Georgia into the fourth quarter only to fall in the end. Mizzou (7-2) can now shift it’s focus to winning out and achieving a 10-2 season, a feat many deemed next-to-impossible heading in to the year.
5 thoughts on Mizzou’s loss to Georgia & the rest of the season
- You don’t like to talk about “good losses” but… It’s the only way to look at Saturday’s game. Missouri came in a 15.5 point favorite and had the ball, down six in the fourth quarter before a bad interception pretty much sealed the game. Sure, the Tigers would like to have the fourth quarter of the LSU game back but when you have a team sitting at 7-2 and you’ve played really good football against the elite of the SEC, it’s no hard to recognize just how good this Mizzou team is.
- A 10-win season is still in play and would make 2023 a special season. There have been six 10-win seasons in program history and, make no mistake about it, if this team wins out and beats Tennessee, 2023 will be remembered as special. Considering the program had failed to win more than six games from 2019-2022, this would be the year that put Mizzou football back on the map. 9-3 is still going to be REALLY good. Anything less than that would show that the team faded down the stretch.
Eli Drinkwitz talks about how his team fought against #1 Georgia
- Brady Cook has been very good this year, but is human. In both of Missouri’s losses (to blue blood programs) Cook has thrown a crushing interception in the game. He threw two in the fourth quarter on Saturday, but it was the first one that occurred with Missouri had the ball, down six that pretty much put the game in ice for Georgia. While Cook is light years ahead of where he was in 2022, his hot start has faded a bit as he’s thrown for 175, 198 and 219 yards in the last three games.
- Cody Schrader is this team’s unsung hero. Schrader carried the ball 22 times for 121 yards and a touchdown against an extremely stout Georgia defense. His 919 rushing yards and 10 touchdowns has been supremely important to Mizzou’s offensive success. The former Division II back has fought through injuries and doubt amongst the public to become a key cog on a nationally-ranked team when many considered him an afterthought when he arrived on campus.
- The Tennessee game will likely now define the season. #14 Tennessee comes to Columbia on Saturday as a slight favorite. It’s probably a complete coin toss at this point. How the Tigers respond from Saturday’s loss against a very good Volunteer team will likely tell the tale of the 2023 season. As I mentioned above, 10-2 is undeniably “special,” while 9-3 would still be seen as “very good.” 8-4 would fall under the “signs of progress but what happened at the end?” Regardless, coach Eli Drinkwitz has shown what Missouri football can become under his watch. The recruiting is very promising and now you have actual evidence on a football field that the program is ascending.
