Missouri’s injury report heading into the SEC matchup with Ole Miss has turned into a real list, and it says plenty about where the Tigers are at physically after six straight weeks of games.
The report has grown since Sammy discussed it yesterday, and the picture is pretty clear: there are a lot of banged-up bodies on this team right now. The timing isn’t ideal, either, with Missouri set for its biggest game of the season tomorrow afternoon and still having one more week to survive before finally getting a break.
A bye week is coming. The Tigers just have to get through this one first.
And the stakes are obvious. If they beat Ole Miss, that changes everything.
Missouri’s trip to Ole Miss on the soccer side went a lot better. The Tigers handled the Rebels 3-0, with Emily Derucki opening the scoring in the 28th minute.
She finished into the bottom right corner with her right foot after a Lana Adams through ball put her in alone with the goalkeeper. Riley Wilkerson helped keep the lead intact by stopping an Isabelle Wright shot in the 43rd minute, and Missouri went into halftime up 1-0 even though Ole Miss held a 6-5 edge in shots.
The Rebels are sitting as the worst team in the SEC, maybe alongside Texas A&M, but teams still have to go out and take care of business against the bottom of the league.
On the gymnastics front, the new season will officially begin for Missouri in 2027 with Zou to the Lou returning on Friday, January 8. It’s an all-Big Ten meet, the first of two podium meets on the regular-season schedule, and this year’s field will include Illinois, Nebraska, and Iowa.
The event is set for the Family Arena in St. Charles during winter break, so a huge crowd probably isn’t in the cards, even if the idea of National Powerhouse Mizzou Gymnastics has a certain ring to it.
Football content was moving fast yesterday, too. Jaden’s Risers and Fallers piece focused on Trajan Greco, and it included a comment from Eli Drinkwitz after the Texas A&M game that gets to the heart of player development:
“He came to grips with the fact that we love him regardless and we just need him to play a little better,” said Drinkwitz after the Texas A&M game. “He had his best week of practice; he was playing fast and free, and you can tell how tight his coverage was and the way he communicated. There was just different confidence in who he was as a person and as a player.”
Greco is tied with nine other SEC players with two interceptions, and his performance against A&M stood out. For Missouri, it’s another reminder that younger players can grow into real contributors.
Colin also dug into three running backs with Missouri ties, including Quinshon Lacy. After rushing for 104 yards on 23 carries as a freshman at Mizzou, Lacy transferred to Ole Miss and turned into a centerpiece for the Rebels, piling up 1,567 rushing yards and 24 touchdowns on 306 carries last season. He also added 29 catches for 177 yards.
The move wasn’t about any bad blood. Lacy simply saw a chance at Ole Miss to develop and make a bigger impact.
And given how Missouri and Luper have consistently been able to produce strong runners, his rise makes sense. He was one of the few freshmen trusted with real snaps because he was that good.
On the betting side, Nathan put together his Best Bets for the week, including Florida at Texas with the Longhorns laying 10.5. His take was blunt: Missouri exposed Florida’s soft underbelly two weeks ago, South Carolina blasted them at home last week, and now they head to Austin to face a Texas team with plenty of motivation.
The Longhorns lost to Florida last year in a game that kept them out of the playoff, and they’re also coming off a collapse against Oklahoma. Nathan expects Texas to get a much-needed bounce-back win.
Sammy is still watching the College Football Playoff rankings, and Missouri remains at No. 16 for now. They’re still on the outside looking in, but tomorrow’s game could carry major spoiler potential.
Ole Miss comes in at 4-1 and No. 9 in the latest AP Top 25 after a 52-17 road win over Vanderbilt, and Trinidad Chambliss is giving the Rebels elite quarterback play. The catch is that their rush defense leaves them vulnerable.
That makes Saturday a game with real playoff implications for Missouri.
Basketball preseason content kept rolling, too. One piece focused on LSU and head coach Will Wade, and it didn’t exactly pull punches. The article revisited the fallout from his rule-breaking, his disappearance after the news broke, and the idea that he could have become a louder advocate for NIL and paying players but didn’t.
Over on ROCKM.PLUS, @DataMizzou looked at how Dennis Gates can make this roster work with so many forwards and so few guards. The concern is obvious from a distance: Missouri has wings and power forwards everywhere, and not nearly as much depth elsewhere. The piece digs into whether that balance can still produce a high-level team.
Watkins is making most of the preseason pieces free to all.
In Other News...
Ole Miss Just Got A Week 7 Upset Call In Oxford
With two ranked SEC teams heading to Oxford in Week 7, the Missouri-Ole Miss matchup already had the feel of a measuring-stick game. Greg McElroy, the former Alabama quarterback turned college football analyst, added another layer by calling for Missouri to walk out with the upset, pointing to the Tigers running game and defense as the edge in a game where the Rebels are expected to have the home-field advantage.
The added wrinkle is Austin Simmons, the former Ole Miss quarterback now lining up for Missouri against his old team. That storyline gives the trip even more bite for Missouri, which will try to make McElroys prediction look prescient in a game that should tell plenty about both teams place in the SEC race. [Read more 🡒]
Mizzou Heads To Ole Miss With One Big Backfield Concern
Missouri heads into the Ole Miss game with plenty of momentum after beating Texas A&M and climbing to 5-1 with a No. 13 national ranking, but the backfield picture has become a little more complicated. Trajen Greco has settled in better on defense, Jamal Roberts has handled a heavier workload while delivering on the ground, and Kenric Lanier II has started to see his role grow on offense.
The encouraging individual developments come with a catch, though, because Roberts has shouldered a huge share of the carries. For a team trying to keep pushing through the SEC grind, that kind of workload raises real questions about depth and durability as Missouri heads to one of its toughest road tests yet. [Read more 🡒]
Mizzou's Backfield Suddenly Carries One More SEC Problem
Missouris backfield picture has shifted quickly enough that the Tigers now head into an SEC matchup with a different kind of uncertainty behind center. Jamal Roberts has stepped into the lead role and given Missouri a dependable rushing presence, while Ahmad Hardys injury has thinned the room and forced the Tigers to adjust on the fly.
There is also the familiar wrinkle of Kewan Lacy, who left Missouri for Ole Miss and now comes back into the conversation as he works his way back from injury. With those paths crossing again, the backfield subplot adds another layer to a game already carrying plenty of SEC weight for Missouri. [Read more 🡒]