Hmmm...I just do not see that getting old any time soon...Big XII North Champions.  Not saying it is my destination, but saying it is nice to see this team accomplish it in back to back seasons when other seasons have had the same expectation. 

At any rate, this was a REALLY busy weekend for Mizzou sports, as the winter sports are geared up and the fall sports are winding down.  Lots of stuff to cover and some random thoughts on football and NASCAR.

Football:

Thanks to DirecTV (all the more ironic since I work for a competitor),I was only able to see that last three quarters of action.  At any rate, I have not read or heard enough to know if the team knew the fate of the UT/kU game when they took the field.  In all honesty, I kind of hope they did know and were able to go out there and take care of business like they did.  Chase looked comfortable again, save for the two interceptions (one which did not count, and the one that did.  Speaking of the one that did not count, I think it is funny that a roughing the passer can negate an INT. To me, the ball is gone, it should be change of possession and 15 yards off...but that is just me).  What I hope happened this past week was that while we continued to pay lip service to the fact that Chase Coffman COULD play, we went ahead and game planned that he would not.  I am not entirely sure we did that for the kSU game, and I think it showed in the offense's efficiency.  This time around, Jones looked more than ready to step in and things clicked better.  As it pertains to Coffman, all the more reason he is the most important cog (except for Daniel) out there and why he needs to be 100 percent for the Championship game.  I will be honest, I think we can beat kU without him, but we do not likely stand a chance against any of the four from the south without him.

On defense...gosh..I wish we could just wrap up and tackle.  WAY too many shoulder tackles which do not work at this level. Saw one from Willy Mo, another from Lambert and others where I do not remember the people specifically.  Nice game by Chavis (even if the announcer could not say his name correctly) and nice to see Gettis further earn his rep as a lock-down corner with an interception.  And I am still looking for the superior effort on D. Wash's long TD run, but the more I see it, the more it just seems to be a product of the system and Washington's really wonderful vision.  He just glided around and took the correct angles which resulted in ISU guys getting naturally sealed off of him and went from there.

As for "hate" week and what-not, you will find I will probably not participate too much in it.  To me, these next two weeks are just a long two weeks without Mizzou playing, with a stop-over for the OU/TTech game next Saturday.  As for some perspective on the season and this accomplishment...maybe next week...we'll see.  I think I am of the opinion that if I do not talk about the closing of this season, it just wont end :-)

Soccer:

Not too much left to cover on this one, as it was pretty well hashed out on the pages of Rock M over this past weekend.  The ladies went right out and stomped on the throat of Evansville on a terrible Friday night with goals in the 3rd minute and the 33rd minute.  A win of 2-0, along with a 2OT thriller between Memphis and Illinois (which Illinois won) figured to have the Tigers in a good spot.  But, after a scoreless 1st half, Illinois got on the board early in the 2nd.  The Tigers fought back on a goal from freshman Mallory Stipetech and evened it at one.  They went all the way to penalty kicks (some would argue a terrible way to finish a game) and were even at 4 goals each on the 5th kick when back-up goalie and occasional field player Mallory Forst stepped up to take the kick.. She was unsuccessful, and the Tigers finished their season with another 2nd round of the NCAA tourney loss, again in 2OT (or more).

Continue reading this post »

34 wins and counting (most ever for a 4-year span at Mizzou, and they're not done yet).

A 12-win season (first ever).

A New Year's Day bowl (first one since four months after Woodstock...the original Woodstock).

A Heisman finalist (first one since before there was a big Heisman ceremony).

A Top 5 finish (the first since…1960, I think?)

This senior class is, quite simply, the greatest senior class to ever play for Missouri.  And because of that, I'd like to take a moment to thank each senior.

--

Van Alexander – for coming back from 116 injuries.

Mack Breed – for sticking it out all five years…and for having an awesome name.

Castine Bridges – for that one-handed, spinning INT in last year's Kansas game.

Colin Brown – for walking on and kicking butt.

Adam Casey and Zach Milligan – for sacrificing a few years for free.

Tommy Chavis – for being extremely underrated.  And for stuffing James Johnson on 4th down in 2006.

Brock Christopher – for intercepting Robert Griffin.

Chase Coffman – for, naturally, thrusting the nunchuk upward.  Oh yeah, and for being the greatest tight end I've ever seen.

Chase Daniel – for simply being the greatest QB in Mizzou History.

Justin Garrett – for hitting really hard (ask Dez Bryant just how hard).

Earl Goldsmith – for scratching out every single yard possible.  And for being named Earl.

Ziggy Hood – for making sure we didn't miss Lorenzo Williams too much.  And for being named Ziggy.

Jimmy Jackson – for being the best bowling ball since Zack Abron.  And for being the "kid from Caruthersville."

Ryan Madison – for starting so long without any fanfare whatsoever.

William Moore – for intercepting Todd Reesing…and Graham Harrell...and Casey Dick...and Eddie McGee...and just about every other QB on the schedule in 2007.  And for driving that awesome car.

Chase Patton – for being the ultimate team player.

Steve Redmond – for sticking around after such a tough setback (injury in senior year).

Tommy Saunders – for being Tommy Saunders.  For bleeding, sweating and crying black and gold.  And for having that awesome hair.

Stryer Sulak – for making sure we didn't miss Brian Smith too much.  And, you guessed it, for being named Stryker.

Jeff Wolfert – for simply being the most accurate kicker of all-time.

And finally...

Aaron O'Neal – for being the driving spirit behind this program's turnaround.  If only you'd been around to see it.

Alright, we're combining the "MU-__ Beyond the Box Score" piece with the "Big 12 BTBS Box Scores" piece...I've bolded the super-duper interesting parts of each box score...

• How was Baylor able to see more offensive success than expected on Saturday?  Success on 2nd downs.  They were okay on 1st downs, but their 2nd down success (which has been a strength of theirs all year, for some reason) kept them out of tough 3rd downs.
• How was Baylor able to run so effectively on Saturday?  It appears the answer is in the trenches.  Baylor's 3.40 Line Yards per carry was higher than their 2.83 season average, and MUCH higher than Missouri's 2.18 season average allowed.  This is something to watch as pass rush specialists Brian "God" Coulter and Jacquies Smith start to see more playing time over run stuffer Tommy Chavis (it's also something to keep in mind next year, when God and Jacq become two of our defensive staples).  While the pass rush is improved by the addition of Coulter and Smith, they might not be as good at holding the line as Chavis is.
• It goes without saying that the first two quarters went more or less as expected.  Turnovers prevented Missouri from probably having a 17- or 21-point lead, but they were dominating in S&P.  And then came the third quarter, where Baylor turned the game on its ear.  Remember last year, when Missouri humiliated team after team in Q3 (sans the Big 12 title game)?  While the offense is still more-or-less holding up its end of the bargain (#2 in Q3 S&P+ in Big 12 play), the defense hasn't been as dominant (only #7 in Q3 S&P+ in Big 12 play).  Mizzou has been fine in Q3 in a lot of games--Texas, Colorado, Nebraska--but Q3 efforts against OSU and Baylor turned the game around against Mizzou.  Is that coaching?  Execution?  Luck?  No idea.
• Taking turnovers into account, the scoring margin actually favors Baylor.  OUCH.  Not at all what we expected to see here, but...survive and advance!  The North title still runs right through Columbia, and if NU beats KU on Saturday, the North title could actually be clinched before the trip to Arrowhead.

Alright, a bit more BU-MU analysis after the jump, then it's on to the other Big 12 games...

Continue reading this post »

Time for a State of the Union (of sorts) address.  We'll start with the bad news.

Bad News

We will not be winning a national title this year.  With all the seniors (and players who won't be in Tiger uniforms next year...cough Maclin cough), I know there was a bit of desperation toward this--we're Mizzou and we don't many chances to win a national title.  We missed out last year, and it turns out that was the closest look we were going to get.  That, for lack of a better term, sucks.  Hard.

We will not be adding a Heisman trophy to our relatively thin trophy case.  I really can't blame Chase Daniel for anything that happened yesterday.  When your receivers are dropping passes, and your offensive line decides to fall into a massive funk right as they play what is by far the best defensive line they'll see this year...and when you spend a lot of your time running for your life, it's just not going to be your day.  I guess it's still technically possible for Chase to win--if Mizzou immediately rediscovers its rhythm up front, Mizzou goes back to scoring 50 points per game, AND Mizzou beats Texas in the Big 12 title game.  But the likelihood of that isn't high enough to actually start hoping for it.

This defense just isn't the unit we hoped to see this year.  With 10 starters back from what turned into a pretty stout unit in conference play last year, we expected the best Mizzou defense in a generation in '08.  Turns out that, for a variety of reasons--lack of effective play-calling, injury to William Moore (and Van Alexander), nobody coming through at CB2 and SS--that has not happened.  What we're left with is a unit with some individual play-makers and a bunch of hard hitters...but not the best Mizzou defense in a generation.  Now, I don't want to take too much from yesterday--Texas hit a rhythm during the OU game, and no defense in the country was going to stop them yesterday.  But it's clear at this point that the players aren't as confident, and Matt Eberflus has yet to get into his play-calling rhythm.  He and the players are both a step behind.

Our time as a Top 5 team is over.  And it's going to take a while to climb back up there.  It was fun while it lasted, wasn't it?

Not only are the remaining teams on our schedule still going to be gunning for us, but they're really actually going to think they can beat us.  The bloom is off the rose.  It's "A-game every game or bust" now.  Do we have the resiliency?  The leadership?  My gut answer is 'yes', but until it's proven on the field, it's just a gut answer.

Once again, we will not be winning a national title this year.  Not trying to rub salt in the wound here, but the quicker we can accept this and readjust our wishlist, the better.

Good News

We can still win the Big 12 title.  Now, it's not likely, but it is technically still a possibility.

We can DEFINITELY still win our second straight Big 12 North title.  The two teams we just played?  Better than any of our remaining five conference opponents.  We can kill Colorado, kill Baylor, kill Kansas State, kill Iowa State, and...well, we can't kill Kansas, but we can beat them, there is no doubt of that.  All it takes is one thing: belief.  Okay, two things: belief and confidence.  When (not if) Mizzou finds its swagger again, it can roll through its remaining regular season slate.  That could happen as soon as this coming Saturday.

We are still in position to possibly own the North for the forseeable future.  Not saying we will, but we certainly could.  Winning the North in 2009 will be rough--we will be replacing like 52 starters.  But no other team has taken a step forward this year, aside from maybe Nebraska in the last two games.  Kansas will still have Reesing and Briscoe in '09, but their defense will have to be rebuilt.  Nebraska loses Ganz, Lucky, its top two WRs, the right side of its OL, and a majority of its solid defensive players.  Colorado...well, they're still not very good.  Kansas State and Iowa State?  No.  Start piling up the North titles, and losses like yesterday's become easier to swallow, whether the North is weak or not.

That defense that isn't as good as we'd hoped?  It's still good enough to whomp the next few offenses on the schedule.  Colt McCoy was amazing at handling the blitz.  Cody Hawkins (and the true freshman now splitting time with him)?  Not amazing.  Josh Freeman?  Not amazing.  Austen Arnaud?  Not amazing.  Robert Griffin?  Guaranteed to make an amazing play or two, but let's just put it this way--if he makes some of the throws that Colt McCoy made yesterday, Griffin won't have the receivers to make those catches.

We still have at least six, maybe seven, games remaining to watch Chase Daniel, Chase Coffman, Jeremy Maclin, William Moore, Stryker Sulak, Brock Christopher, Tommy Chavis, Ziggy Hood, and a bunch of other guys who have brought Mizzou a new level of success.  That needed to be said.

--

It's okay to still be bitter about these last 8 days.  The last two Saturday nights have CRUSHED our team, our fans, and our goals.  But in six days, the bitterness ends.  It's time for Homecoming, and it's time to circle the wagons for another North division title.

(Oh yeah, and 2003 Kansas State.)

As we look at this season's to-date BTBS stats, keep in mind that we can approximately say that Mizzou and UT have played similar schedules.  I mean, OU > OSU, but Illinois > anybody UT played in non-conference.  In the end, it's more or less balanced out (to my naked eye, anyway), and we can take these stats at something close to face value.

Thoughts...

• This game will likely lie on the right arms of the two BFF's, Chase Daniel and Colt McCoy, as both teams have pretty stout run defenses.  UT's run defense is a little better, but MU's run offense is better, so unless Ogbonnaya continues to break off 1-2 big runs a game, this is pretty much a wash.
• One thing I find interesting: UT allows 2.28 line yards per carry.  So does Mizzou.  That's a very good number, but looking at the overall rushing numbers, I'd have expected a little better for UT.  For instance, they allow a 0.455 rushing S&P (compared to Mizzou's 0.542); but UT and Mizzou have allowed the exact same LY/carry.  The reason: while Mizzou has allowed few big rushes (longest five rushes: 68, 41, 35, 22, 18), UT has allowed almost no big rushes (longest five carries: 26, 26, 21, 21, 19).  Really, the only difference between the Mizzou rush defense and that of Texas is Kendall Hunter's 68-yard TD run and a 41-yard scamper by Illinois' Daniel Dufrene (which I do not even remotely remember--that game was a Shiner-and-Jager-fueled blur).
  
• Both teams are good at the leverage (avoiding Passing Downs on offense, moving opponents toward them on defense).  They stay near 80% leverage while holding their opponents near 60-65%.  Mizzou held OSU near 65%, while Texas held OU to 66%.  Again, this is important because even teams who generally perform well on Passing Downs can get bitten by them eventually (Mizzou against OSU, for instance).  The lower the leverage %, the more passing downs a team has to face.
• To no one's surprise, Mizzou has been more explosive than Texas to date (0.54 PPP vs 0.48 PPP).  UT's PPP has risen in the last couple of games, thanks to a few long plays to Chris Ogbonnaya.  I can't figure Ogbonnaya out--he doesn't look fast at all, but defenders can't seem to catch up to him.  And I don't know how much of his success has been due to his own skills or the skills of Colt McCoy and the guys blocking for him, but he's torched a decent defense (Colorado) and a good one (Oklahoma) so far, and you can't argue with results.
• Both teams have similar S&P margins, both overall and in close games.  In close games, MU is +0.427 (1.125 on offense, 0.698 on defense), while UT is +0.453.
• Both teams have the tendency to give up some big pass plays (they both allow at least 0.34 PPP in the passing game), but the key for Texas will be holding Mizzou as close as possible to the 37% success rate that Texas opponents have managed so far, instead of the 62% Mizzou has put up.  And it all ends up tying together.  An unsuccessful passing attempt here and there means more Passing Downs...and Mizzou sucked on Passing Downs against OSU.
• And speaking once more of Passing Downs, both defenses have been identically strong in this regard.
• Turnovers could always swing either way, but so far Mizzou has had a tendency of making more of the turnover game than UT has--they've benefitted from t/o's by about 3 more points per game.
• Mizzou's offense is best in Q1 and Q3, while their defense is best in Q2 and Q4, but overall they've been pretty consistently strong in both categories.  Meanwhile, OU game aside, UT has been best on offense in the first half and best on defense in the second half.
• Texas' defense has the overall advantage on Mizzou's, but Mizzou has been better (and allowed fewer big plays) on third downs.  Keep that in mind.

Projections after the jump.

Continue reading this post »

So as I was entering play-by-play data yesterday, I had an extra spring in my step.  I was very curious what the BTBS data would say about this game...how it would explain the whole "outgained them, broke even on turnovers...still lost at home" thing.  Well...now I'm wishing I hadn't looked at this...wishing I had just skipped right over the BTBS piece this week.  Mizzou dominated in almost every statistical category except one: Passing Downs.  You know that whole concept of "leverage" that I've been pushing recently?  If you haven't hopped on board the Leverage train yet, you might want to do so now, as Leverage cost Mizzou an undefeated record.

• So Missouri outgained OSU in terms of yards and EqPts...
• They split in turnover margin...
• They out-leveraged them (in terms of how many Passing Downs they forced)...
• They won the field-position battle...
• They dominated the OSU O-line in terms of line yards (OSU was averaging over 3.6 line yards per carry)...
• They didn't miss their season S&P average by much...
• They held OSU to what was by far their lowest S&P of the season...
• And they lost.  Because they were absolutely horrific on Passing Downs.
• There were 6 turnovers in the game, and almost all of them were relatively huge.  Mizzou's were worth 4.68 points (Danario trips and falls), 5.89 points (Daniel bombs it to nobody in particular), and 4.37 points (Lavine steps in front of Maclin).  OSU's were worth 6.13 points (Baston recovers fumble at end of half), 3.66 points (Bridges INT) and 4.28 points (Moore sticks Bryant, Gettis recovers).  Any one of those doesn't happen, and the result is probably significantly different.
• Finally, I can't say enough about how well OSU tackled.  They were fast, and they didn't miss.  That was the biggest reason they held Mizzou to 0.40 Points Per Play.

More analysis after the jump.

Continue reading this post »

I may have posted the BTBS 'box' yesterday, but there's still plenty to discuss.  Let's look back at last week's preview and see how things shook down.

Nebraska's 46% success rate is pretty solid; Mizzou's 58% success rate (60% in close games) is ridiculous.

Nebraska: 39.7% success rate, 40.9% while the game was close
Missouri: 56.9% success rate, 56.3% while the game was close

So NU held Mizzou a smidge below its season success rate...but still couldn't stop the big play.  Meanwhile, NU didn't have nearly enough offensive consistency.

If you can force Nebraska into passing downs, they're not able to complete them as well as they did last year, back when Marlon Lucky was alive.

Nebraska: 6-for-22 on passing downs.  They were 5-for-11 passing (2 successful passes to Nate Swift, 2 to Todd Peterson, 1 to Menelik Holt) with 1 sack, and they were 1-for-5 rushing. 

They were 2-for-4 in Q1 (that's when the two passes to Swift came), 4-for-18 the rest of the game.

Nebraska is a Q1/Q3 team.  They gameplan well offensively, and they backslide a smidge once the gameplan runs out and they actually have to adjust.

Nebraska Offense

Q1: 50.0% success rate / 0.42 PPP / 0.924 S&P
Q2: 30.0% success rate / 0.18 PPP / 0.484 S&P
Q3: 37.5% success rate / 0.15 PPP / 0.522 S&P

And the game was over in Q4.

They really did gameplan pretty well, with the rollouts and such, but once Mizzou got comfortable (which didn't take long), it was over fast.

Mizzou's offense is disgustingly consistent from Q1 to Q3.  We hear a lot about Mizzou's "fast starts", but a fast start suggests a fall-off.  They start fast and stay fast.

Missouri Offense

Q1: 61.5% success rate / 0.70 PPP / 1.320 S&P (skewed by Maclin's long TD)
Q2: 50.0% success rate / 0.40 PPP / 0.903 S&P
Q3: 72.7% success rate / 1.23 PPP / 1.953 S&P

So a slight dropoff in Q2, but only to 0.903.  That's still good.  I do find one thing ironic, though: remember how NU's coaches bragged about the fantastic gameplan they'd put together?  Well Mizzou was unbelievable in the "gameplan" quarters (Q1/Q3).  That's some good coaching by Nebraska, huh?

The game could be made or broken on third downs.

Mizzou on 3rd downs: 77.8% success rate / 1.487 PPP / 2.264 S&P
Nebraska on 3rd downs: 63.2% success rate / 0.391 PPP / 1.022 S&P

Nebraska was a little too successful on 3rd downs for my taste, but while they were just barely converting (0.391 PPP), Missouri was breaking the Points Per Play chart (1.487).  Again, S&P is a lot like OPS in baseball--anything over 0.900 is pretty good.  A 2.264 S&P is "Barry Bonds in the 2002 World Series" good.

(Correction: Barry Bonds only put up a 1.994 OPS in the 2002 World Series.  My bad.  The Missouri offense on third downs was better than Barry Bonds in the 2002 World Series.)

Continue reading this post »

Here are your Monday media notes...

Lee Corso might be doing the Tigers’ defense a favor every Saturday morning. The wily ESPN “College Gameday” pundit picked Missouri to play for the national championship but continues to pick on the defense. He called the defense “lousy” during last week’s show in Nashville. Watching from their hotels in Nebraska, the Tigers were listening.

“Absolutely,” linebacker Brock Christopher said. “We sit in our hotel all day and listen about how good our offense is, which they are, and how we’re not good. We use it as motivation and kind of joke around with it. We take note of what they’re saying and put a chip on our shoulder.”

“Man, it always gets old, but we’ve been hearing that for a while now,” linebacker Sean Weatherspoon said. “Hopefully, he just gives us a little more motivation this week. I definitely make a point to bring it up. On our last walk-through, me, William Moore and Ziggy” Hood “talk about the nay-sayers and how we want to prove them wrong. I think that’s giving us an edge to go out there and dominate.”

More rankings, more love for Mizzou.  This time it's Rivals.com and another #2 spot  Meanwhile, plenty of ridiculous love for Mizzou in Heisman rankings too.  SI's Gene Menez has Chase Daniel still at #1, and Jeremy Maclin #5.  Four of the top 5 candidates are from the Big 12.  I mean, we knew the Big 12 was the best offensive conference, but this is historically good.

OSU Links!

• MUtigers.com: official release ("If recent history is any indicator, however, look for Saturday's game to be a tightly-contested one, as all but one of the 6 previous meetings have been decided by 7 points or fewer, and 3 of them have gone into overtime (all won by Mizzou). The 1996 overtime win by Mizzou (35-28) marked MU's first-ever overtime game.")
• OKstate.com: official release ("With the offensive firepower that will be in uniform Saturday night in Columbia, it’s probably worth noting that the highest scoring game in the series took place in 1997 when the Tigers edged the Cowboys, 51-50, in Stillwater. OSU has reached the 30-point mark against the Tigers 11 times.")
• Tulsa World: The long, hard road
  
• Daily Oklahoman: [Brandon] Pettigrew day-to-day
  
• The Missourian: Missouri claims few similarities to Oklahoma State
• Daily Oklahoman: Give [Dez] Bryant a break
  
• Post-Dispatch: Oklahoma State grabs Mizzou's attention
• KC Star: No. 17 Cowboys seek respect against No. 3 Tigers
• Daily Oklahoman: No three-and-outs for Missouri
  

It's Like Father, Unlike Son!

It's Dave Matter's Big 12 Football News & Notes!

Brock Christopher: gaining respect.  If not for Tommy Chavis, I'd say Christopher's been the most underrated player on the team the last couple of years.

I missed this earlier, but the Post-Dispatch has a lovely photo gallery from Saturday's game.

Quick switch to basketball recruiting: Rivals has a nice, long story (with video!) on Michael Snaer and his future.

Finally, because we've gotten a ridiculous number of hits from google searches for this pic, I'll post it again...god bless Warren Buffett.

I was looking back at the first posts made on RMN recently...and it reminded me that last year, along with the BTBS piece, I threw together a unit-by-unit preview of the upcoming game as well.  How's about we try that again?

Oh yeah, and leave your own predictions and/or random comments in the comments below.

QB vs QB

I can honestly say without hesitation that Mizzou would win this category against any team in the country.  This one needs no explanation.  Advantage: Mizzou.

MU RBs vs NU LBs

I'll say this: Cody Glenn has worked out better at LB than I thought he would--you'd figure there would be a one-year transition period, but he's stepped up well and is leading the Huskers in tackles from his weakside LB position.  He's even 3rd on the team in tackles for loss, plus he's broken up three passes and forced a fumble.  Problem is, his counterparts have been underwhelming.  Phillip Dillard is okay, but the strongside LB position has produced next to nothing.  Granted, they'll likely be in a nickel most of Saturday, but regardless, this LB unit is still limited.

Oh yeah, and Derrick Washington is really, really good.  Advantage: Mizzou.

MU WRs/TEs vs NU DBs

NU Secondary = work in progress.  MU receiving corps = best in America.  Advantage: Mizzou.

MU O-line vs NU D-line

This is an interesting matchup; it will probably be where the game is decided.  The starting front four for Nebraska--Zach Potter, Ndamukong Suh, Ty Steinkuhler, and Pierre Allen--has been downright solid for the Huskers.  There are two problems, however.

1) Though we've heard pretty good things about freshman DE Cameron Meredith, there is almost no depth whatsoever with this unit.  Their rotation is small, which means either a) they continue with their small rotation against Missouri and wear down by the third quarter, or b) they open up a big rotation to keep guys fresh, and a lot of guys who are either too inexperienced or not good enough to have earned playing time get a lot of snaps.  Either way, that's a bad thing for Nebraska.

2) Illinois' D-line is likely better than the Husker unit, and Illinois got little to no pressure on Chase Daniel.  Maybe you've heard this once or twice on RMN, ahem, but getting pressure on Chase Daniel with your front four is your only means of survival against the Mizzou offense.  Elvis Fisher and Colin Brown are proving to be a ridiculously good set of bookend tackles.

In other words, Advantage: Mizzou.

NU RBs vs MU LBs

Even though I've never been as high on Marlon Lucky as some, I still always saw him as a solid back, particularly on 3rd down.  He's picking a bad time to not live up to even my expectations.  Granted, there's still a lot of time left in his senior season, but he just hasn't been very dynamic at all.  Sophomore Roy Helu Jr. seems to have passed him in terms of potential and upside, and fellow sophomore Quentin Castille is getting the short-yardage carries.  It's now a three-headed RB attack for Nebraska, and last week's 15-carry, 46-yard performance from the RBs against Virginia Tech didn't exactly fill me with the fear that Nebraska will be able to control the pace and grind out the clock with the running game.  They'll have to rely on the short passing game for that.

Oh yeah, and Brock Christopher and Sean Weatherspoon are freaking fantastic.  Advantage: Mizzou.

Continue reading this post »

We had a bye week, and there's no game for me to review...so let's go ahead and talk about Nebraska, shall we?

So the NCAA.org site from which I get my play-by-plays is screwing me this week, as half their games from last week aren't in the database correctly yet.  That's preventing me from having the up-to-date '+' numbers I was hoping to have for conference play.  Oh well, I guess.  Instead, what you get is one monster BTBS season box score for both Mizzou and Nebraska.  And after the jump, I'll play with projections the way I have been for the other '08 games so far.

If you have any questions about these numbers, please ask them.  At some point I'll get to the new BTBS Glossary I've promised...but it hasn't happened yet.  And if your eyes glaze over looking at numbers, check out the bullets after the box.

Thoughts...

• Nebraska has actually lost the field position battle (Field Position % = plays you've run in your opponent's territory vs plays they've run in your territory) so far this year.  They've come up with some big plays so far, but that's a little bit alarming.  Some teams are really good at the bend-don't-break thing, but it's a dangerous game.
• Less than 1/4 of Missouri's plays are Passing Downs.  Oh yeah, and they're just about the best in the country at converting Passing Downs.
• Nebraska's 46% success rate is pretty solid; Mizzou's 58% success rate (60% in close games) is ridiculous.
• Mizzou's only giving up 2.23 Line Yards per carry.  I thought it would be higher than that, even against relatively weak competition.  That's a stout run defense right there.
• Nebraska's passing game is downright solid, especially considering Joe Ganz only has one 'shows up every game' weapon at his disposal, Nate "Remember Me?" Swift.
• Oh yeah, and Mizzou's 1.275 Passing S&P is unbelievable.
• If you can force Nebraska into passing downs, they're not able to complete them as well as they did last year, back when Marlon Lucky was alive.
• Mizzou is the poster child for why Turnover Points Margin is so much more telling than Turnover Margin.  What happens when you put up 3 INT's for TD in 4 games?  You average a more than 6-point turnover advantage per game.
  
• Nebraska is a Q1/Q3 team.  They gameplan well offensively, and they backslide a smidge once the gameplan runs out and they actually have to adjust.
• Meanwhile, their defense is pretty stout in Q4.  Don't know if that's because of the competition or not, but let's just go ahead and make sure this game is out of reach in Q3, shall we?
  
• Mizzou's offense is disgustingly consistent from Q1 to Q3.  We hear a lot about Mizzou's "fast starts", but a fast start suggests a fall-off.  They start fast and stay fast.  Their Q4 numbers are down, but put little stock in that--they've only played their starters in Q4 in 2 of 4 games.  They weren't wonderful offensively against Illinois in Q4, but that's a quite small sample size, no?
• Mizzou's offense is RIDICULOUS on first downs.  A 1.623 S&P?  Seriously?
• The game could be made or broken on third downs.  Nebraska is -0.062 S&P on third downs (0.642 on offense, 0.708 on defense), while Mizzou is +0.383.  You have to figure that home field advantage is most apparent on third downs, so Mizzou's advantage will shrink because of that...but that's still pretty significant right there.

Alright, projections after the jump...

Continue reading this post »