Mizzou’s NFL rookies wasted no time getting involved in preseason action, with several former Tigers putting their names on the stat sheet in their first taste of the league.
Zion Young opened his pro account with his first NFL tackle in the Ravens’ 24-7 win over the Eagles. Josiah Trotter, Jr. followed with a bigger night, recording two tackles in the Bucs’ 24-16 win over the Jets.
Chris McClellan also made his mark, notching a tackle as his Packers fell 28-9 to the Steelers. Former Tiger Ty’Ron Hopper added four tackles, including one for a loss, in that game as well.
Toriano Pride turned in the biggest individual performance of the group, leading the Buffalo Bills with six tackles in their 29-14 preseason win over the Panthers. For a seventh-round pick, that’s a strong first impression.
Not every Tiger rookie got the chance to show what he could do. Kevin Coleman, Jr. was sidelined by a day-to-day injury, and Keagen Trost exited in the first quarter with a hamstring injury.
Back on campus, Austin Simmons’ left-handedness is already changing the way Mizzou’s offense looks. Donovan Olugbode said the ball comes off the left side differently.
“Just the way it spins and how it drops over the shoulder, it becomes more about the stance towards the sideline, so that’s probably the biggest difference,” Olugbode said after practice Friday.
Olugbode and Cayden Lee are both seasoned SEC wide receivers, but Caleb Goodie has had a tougher adjustment during the transfer process.
“It’s definitely challenging, but I’d say I’ve become accustomed to it. It’s just playing faster and playing with a left-handed quarterback; it’s just getting used to that,” Goodie said.
The shift affects the run game too, which makes the adjustment even more interesting given how central that part of the offense is.
Elsewhere, Dan reflected on his first year with the Track & Field team in a piece packed with numbers and perspective. He shot 66 practices and 14 meets, including three SEC Championships and two NCAA Championships, and traveled 18,736 miles across nine states. Along the way, he captured 107,532 photos, edited and delivered 5,497 of them, and used 5,283 gigabytes of storage on his archival server.
He called the experience transformative, pointing to the people he met, the places he visited and the way the work pushed him further than ever before.
And in soccer, Missouri set a program record in a 3-1 win over Murray State thanks to a lightning-fast opening goal. Senior forward Brianna Buels scored just 15 seconds into the match, the fastest goal in Missouri soccer history. Freshman Rylie Morse started the play in midfield, found Emily Derucki, and Derucki laid it off for Buels to finish from point-blank range.
That kind of start can change everything in a hurry.
In Other News...
Missouris Last Unsettled Starting Battle Is Coming Into Focus
Missouris 12th fall camp practice had the feel of a team narrowing in on its final decisions for 2026. The media saw the Tigers working through offensive line drills, special teams work and quarterback stations, another sign that camp is moving from evaluation mode toward clarity. It also drew a notable crowd, with NFL scouts from the Steelers and Dolphins on hand along with a visit from Cam Newton.
There is still one spot on the line that has not been settled, and it has become the last real question hanging over the starting lineup. What happens there will help shape how the Tigers look up front when the season arrives, and it is the kind of battle that can influence everything from protection to consistency to how quickly Missouri can settle into its identity. For now, the attention around camp is shifting toward the final call, with the rest of the lineup looking much closer to locked in. [Read more 🡒]
Mizzous Top 25 Ranking Comes With A Brutal 2026 Reality
Missouris place in the preseason AP top 25 gives the program another early spotlight under Eli Drinkwitz, and it also reinforces how far the Tigers have climbed in the national conversation. It is the 12th time in school history Missouri has opened the year ranked in the preseason poll, and only the second time that has happened during Drinkwitzs tenure, a sign that expectations around Columbia are no longer built only on optimism.
The hard part comes when the schedule turns into reality. Missouri is set to face five teams ranked in the preseason top 10 during the 2026 season, with three of those games coming at home, and the overall slate is viewed as tougher than last years. In the SEC, where difficult matchups rarely arrive one at a time, that kind of schedule leaves little room for the Tigers to settle in before the pressure starts stacking up. [Read more 🡒]