Put your guns up

by rptgwb Sat Oct 20, 2007 at 09:19:44 PM EDT

On a day that featured two teams expected to get in an old-fashioned shootout, the Tigers took care of business at home, "mauling" (via ESPN) Cap'n Mike Leach and his Pirates Red Raiders, 41-10. Game recaps can be found here and here.




It was a long day for the Heisman hopefuls...

With the Tigers still in control of their Big 12 North destiny, there are many handshakes to be passed around in this week's rendition of Good, Bad, and Indifferent.

Click "Full Story" for Good, Bad, and Indifferent

  • ::

GOOD:

-- Jimmy "JJ" Jackson: JJ did not finish with the most rushing yards (that honor belonged to Derrick Washington, who had a solid day), but his vision and commitment to hitting the holes was exactly what Missouri needed against a Texas Tech defense full of holes. His three touchdown day should make the post-Temple future look that much brighter.
-- Chase "Y-Button" Coffman: On a rather quiet day for Missouri pass catchers, Coffman came up big both as a receiver and as a blocker. (Nickname note: Coffman's commitment to hurdling EVERY defender leads us to call him "Y-Button," the Xbox button used to hurdle)
-- Martin "T-Ruck" Rucker: Everything listed above (minus the Y-Button remarks) applies to Rucker as well, even though the "MotherRucker" formation was not at its best (my apologies to MizzouRobot).
-- The ENTIRE Mizzou defense: Just because they continue to amaze in conference play, I'm going to go ahead and break it down...
-- D-Line: Chavis, Sulak, Hood, Williams and Gaines played well against a large Tech offensive line. The rush kept Graham Harrell off-balance, and the large amount of stunting was an outstanding way to try to exploit that large but somewhat slow O-line. And for the second-straight year against Tech, a Mizzou D-lineman returned a Harrell pick for a touchdown, setting the tone for another dominating Tiger victory.
-- Linebacker Corps: Weatherspoon, Christopher, and Alexander played a large role in holding Tech to negative rushing yards, and, more importantly, did an excellent job in coverage and in pursuit, wrapping up Tech receivers and making sure the YAC yardage remained low.
-- Pig Brown's defense: Our beloved Pig finished with 14 tackles, two break-ups, a pick, and several thunderous hits on Red Raider wideouts.
-- Coaching: The defensive scheme was outstanding, the offensive playcalling took what the Tech defense was giving, and the players seemed confident and motivated entering the game. The defensive blitzing put hands in passing lanes and bodies towards Harrell. The offense felt no need to force the pass, especially in the second half. And the fake punt call on the first drive set the tone for the rest of the game. And compared to some of the calls Leach made on the other sideline, Pinkel is looking golden right now.

BAD

-- Kickoff coverage: Adam Crossett was not bad kicking off, but the coverage unit continues to be suspect. Edward Britton was a block shy of some HUGE returns on several occasions. The team got away with it today, but players like K-State's Jordy Nelson may not be as forgiving.
-- Pig Brown's offense: 3 of Tech's ten points had no business being on the board. Pig had visions of another touchdown return (a la Illinois game) and failed to protect the football, coughing up an intercepted pass to Danny Amendola for a Tech first down, giving the Red Raiders the chance for Alex Trlica to put three on the board towards the end of the first half.
-- The wave: Allow me to direct you to http://www.rockmnation.com/story/200... diary, which I think sums it up...

INDIFFERENT

-- Chase Daniel: Chase wasn't great by any stretch of the imagination, but luckily, he didn't have to be. His stats (14-19, 210 yards, 1 TD, 1 INT) were indicative of a rather slow passing day and were helped by the late 57-yard touchdown pass to Jeremy Maclin. At times, Daniel looked indecisive (although that's somewhat to be expected against a Cover-4), and the interception in the endzone could have hurt far worse than it did. But Daniel did what he had to do to get his team the win.
-- Crowd: Starting to realize the Nebraska-game atmosphere was just lightning in a bottle...

So, what do you say, members of Rock M Nation, or, for that matter, Double T Nation? Feel free to add your thoughts below or in your own diary on the right.


Tags: Good, Bad, and Indifferent (all tags)

Comments Disabled | 15 comments

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  • Hmmm... (none / 0)

    I believe I had it called correctly:

    Blowout- Check
    Running game- Check
    Tight End game- Check
    Harrell INTs- Check

    http://bullyforoldmizzou.blogspot.co...

    Solid game some are calling the best in Pinkel era. I honestly think the Nebraska games at Faurot in '05 and '07 were, but I'm bias cause I was there for those. Tech is a better team, but we kicked their ass today.

    Great momentum for next week's marquee matchup with.......Iowa freakin' State.

    by Big Head on Sat Oct 20, 2007 at 09:51:08 PM EDT

  • the crowd near us... (none / 0)

    ...sucked ass.  The 'extra' Mizzou fans that attended this game and bumped the crowd over 63K really didn't need to be there...the females were just chatting and the males were drunk and ignorant.  I realize I just summed up a good majority of the crowd at any game, but it was infinitely worse today than normal.  Against Nebraska, the crowd is one.  Against everybody else, the crowd is stupid.

    Other thoughts...

    -- I like "Y-button".  I'm a PS2 guy, and I'm pretty sure the hurdle is the 'triangle' button...I think Y-button sounds better.  Guess the other option would be "Edwin Moses".  Chase "Moses" Coffman.

    -- The kickoff coverage got a bit better with each progressive kickoff.  I guess that's something.

    -- Loved the rushing game.  Thought it would be quite a while before I saw a Mizzou team rush 50 times again...but against Tech, it kinda sorta makes sense.  And each backup offers something different.  Jackson, as they were saying after the game, runs so low to the ground that he's just plowing through people's knees.  Washington is super-patient and pretty damn strong.  He's gonna be something else.  I still don't like Goldsmith getting too many touches, but he was strong up the middle.  And Marcus...god bless Marcus.  Love that kid.  Sucks that his career hasn't turned out all that well, but he's a great kid, and he had some nice runs in the 4th.

    -- Stupid KU.

    -- Pig Brown's had a great and terrible couple of weeks.  His last-line-of-defense play has been damn near perfect, as we gave up exactly one big play against OU and Tech combined.  However, he's had bad luck when the ball hits his hands.  He had the huge drop last week, and this week he fumbled so hard we though (in the 61st row) that he had tried to lateral it, lol.

    -- 4th-and-44!!  Ha!!

    by The Boy on Sat Oct 20, 2007 at 10:46:01 PM EDT

  • Blowout???? (none / 0)

    I just first want to say congrats on the win, I know how much it means to the Mizzou program, and all the fans now "think" they are valadated.  

    Now for those of you who really don't know football let me tell you Mizzou is not 31 points better than Texas Tech.  The scoreboard does not show how good Mizzou played but how poorly Tech played.  You can easily take 14 points off of Mizzou's score, 7 for the first touchdown (honestly how many passes hit a defenders facemask and hang in the air for 4 seconds allowing a defender to run under it?????).  The other 7 was the Chase Daniel fumble on 3rd down, all camera's clearly showed Tech recovering the fumble.  Miracously a Mizzou player comes out of the pile with the ball and it's first and goal Mizzou?????????  Without those gifts from the football Gods the score is ??27/10??.  How many dropped passes did Tech have?  more than the entire season combined.  Mizzou deserves NO credit for dropped passes.  I counted 3 times where a Mizzou player was drapped over a Tech receiver and the pass was "dropped" (it's hard to catch a pass when you have a pig on your back).

    I am not saying that Tech is the better team,  I still think at home Mizzou wins that game without the ball bounceing their way so much.  But in no way is Mizzou 31 points better than Tech.  What happens if the tipped balls fall to the ground?  Or Daniel's fumble is rulled correctly, or Tech doesn't drop some 4th down passes?  Let's hope there is a rematch on neutral field, and we get to see if Mizzou is really THAT much better than Tech.  

    For those of you who don't agree, drink a little less Gold-Aid and learn your football!

    by Anonymous Hero on Mon Oct 22, 2007 at 02:18:18 PM EDT

    • Well, (none / 0)

      Say what you will about the amount of "Gold-Aid" consumed among Rock M Nation readers, but the outcome of Saturday isn't indicative of needing to "learn football."

      Regardless of how the points were scored, consider this: Mizzou was favored by only 3.5 points. Mizzou covered this spread by 27.5 points. The Tigers beat Tech nearly eight times worse than expected.

      There is no doubt that Missouri didn't get Tech's best shot and drops by he receivers, poor work by Harrell, and questionable coaching by Leach had an immeasurable impact on the outcome. But saying the fans "don't know football" because "Mizzou is not 31 points better" is an indictment of Tech grasping for moral victories in the same way Missouri fans did for years.

      by rptgwb on Mon Oct 22, 2007 at 07:44:49 PM EDT

      [ Parent ]

  • No Moral Victory! (none / 0)

    In no way was I "grasping for a moral victory" just simply stating the fact that Mizzou is not 31 points better than Tech as a football team.  A fact you agree with, since you understand that you did not get the best the Raiders have.  That's all I was trying to establish.  

    I think Kansas is overrated and fully expect you guys to win the North, but was not that impressed with your team.  Chase Daniel is not near the QB I thought he was, some argument could be made that he didn't need to be to win.  It's obvious he cannot make all the throws needed on the football field, luckily for him he hasn't needed to (except at OU where you lost).  

    I am not nearly as scared of Mizzou after Saturday's game as I was before the game.  Fake punts, and gimmik plays are all you have against a team that has better athletes.  Sure you can beat teams like Tech that have the same or less athletes.  But, when you play a team with better athletes (OU) your offense is very weak.  Same can be said for Texas Tech.  Good luck with your season hope to see you in the Big 12 Championship Game!

    by Anonymous Hero on Mon Oct 22, 2007 at 08:21:49 PM EDT

    • all I can add to the conversation... (none / 0)

      ...is that a) you didn't get our best either, as Tony Temple was out and Jeremy Maclin was hobbled, and we still scored 41, and b) we played OU--the aforementioned team with better athletes--and, once again without Temple, put up 31 on the road.  And as far as Daniel goes...he can make all the throws he needs to, but he can't make all the throws he wants to.  That 2nd-quarter pick was an insane attempt to thread the needle from about 25 yards away...he makes mistakes like that from time to time, but even with the picks he's pretty much played well enough to beat almost every team he's played so far in his college career...2006 Nebraska and OU games aside.  

      I'm definitely not cocky enough to say that Mizzou is 31 points better than Tech by any means, but I thought I needed to point that out.

      by The Boy on Tue Oct 23, 2007 at 08:53:08 AM EDT

      [ Parent ]

  • Temple??? (none / 0)

    Ummmmmmm?????? OK???? ( to the above post)

    Tony Temple would not have made a shread of difference, that game had nothing to do with him.  That game had everything to do with Texas Tech not performing as well as everyone knows they can.  From a stats point of view and a football view it was a lot less of how well Mizzou offense or defense did and a lot more how the Tech offense.  Except for the 4th quarter Tech defense (the awful defense) did very well against the 6th best offense in the nation.  Mizzou defense did alright, the Tech offense did horrible.  That's all the game was about!

    by Anonymous Hero on Tue Oct 23, 2007 at 07:17:41 PM EDT

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