Better Late Than Never

Missing their head coach and their starting running back the Tigers took to the field on senior day this past Saturday looking to become bowl eligible. After two quick scores from the Texas Tech Red Raiders, Mizzou fell behind 14-0. Horrible open field tackling and yards after the catch became the exposed weakness of the defense early in the game. The secondary allowed quarterback Seth Doege to go 17-for-26 with 126 in the first half. He completed pass after pass up the middle of the field and successfully ran slant routes up both sidelines without much resistance. Atrocious scrambling from James Franklin and an inconsistent run game prevented the Tigers from scoring until the second quarter. The offense did prove however that they were up to the challenge of playing from behind when they went on a long 10-play 90 yard drive to score their first touchdown on a 5 yard rush by Franklin.

Mizzou came out and quickly solidified the fact that they are a second half team. They outscore the Red Raiders 14-10 in the second half to narrow the gap to 27-24. Franklin always seems to grow up in front of our eyes during the second half of games. Whether during the come back attempt at Arizona State or a successful come back against Texas Tech. Franklin played a role in each of Mizzou’s four touchdowns. He had 324 yards on the game 172 through the air and 152 on the ground. The drive that started with 6:06 left on the clock was arguably the most important drive of James Franklin’s career thus far. Senior day. Last home game of the season. Last home game as a Big 12 school. Becoming bowl eligible. Putting off the field issues aside. It was a drive that could end all of those things on a good note. Everything relied on Franklin and it would start on the Mizzou 11 yard line. On that drive Franklin threw for 35 yards and ran for 43. He capped it off by outrunning everyone on the Texas Tech sideline and making it into the end zone, giving the Tigers a 31-27 lead. Their first lead of the game. The drive left 2:41 on the clock, plenty of time for the Tech offense to give all 54,000 people at Faurot Field a heart attack. Doege marched the Tech offense down the field to the Missouri 6 yard line. On what could be seen as the luckiest play of the defense’s season, Dominique Hamilton tipped a pass from Doege and Michael Sam intercepted the ball to protect the comeback.

The win wasn’t pretty. The offense started slow and the defense played sloppy. If all you care about is wins and loses then you would be pretty content with the Tigers right now. However, if you look at the flaws within the win, you would be very concerned for the last few games of the season. Including the Boarder War rivalry game next week against Kansas.