COLUMBIA, Mo. 鈥 Missouri鈥檚 hosting a brunch party on Saturday, which means it鈥檚 time to tidy things up.
The No. 6 Tigers face No. 24 Boston College at 11:45 a.m. at home, the only ranked-on-ranked game of the day. As a result, there will be plenty of eyes on the game 鈥 not just from another sellout crowd, but from a broader audience intrigued by MU鈥檚 possible status as a College Football Playoff contender and the Eagles鈥 hot start.
Any anonymity granted by starting the season against the likes of Murray State and Buffalo will fade under the sunshine of a matinee game. When the 2024 season is all said and done, Boston College might not be a Top 25 team. But it is this week, making it a more pressing test for the Tigers.
鈥淲e鈥檙e going to have to play better than we have the past two weeks,鈥 Missouri coach Eli Drinkwitz said. 鈥淲e鈥檙e going to have to clean up penalties. Going to have to play fundamentally sound. We鈥檙e going to have to find ways to create explosives in the pass game. Going to have to be a lot more physical at the line of scrimmage 鈥 we have to sustain blocks without holding. Lot of things that we can improve on, that we鈥檙e going to have to improve on in order to compete in this game.鈥
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His point about penalties was an emphasis in practice. Mizzou, through two games, ranked near the top of the Southeastern Conference in a metric no team wants to be high up the leaderboard in: penalties.
All of the Tigers鈥 infractions have been on offense, which leaves room to tidy up the blocking technique mentioned by Drinkwitz and eliminate formation penalties that also popped up in Week 2.
Explosive plays have been tough to come by so far. Quarterback Brady Cook and a deep crop of wide receivers have been close on some deep passes 鈥 and, to their credit, mined some pass interference penalties off incompletions 鈥 but have yet to connect in a significant way.
That hasn鈥檛 mattered much so far, partly because MU has enjoyed a steep talent advantage over its competition. But even without the big plays, the Tigers鈥 offense has been quite efficient.
Through two games, Missouri picked up 58 first downs 鈥 30 on the ground, 23 through the air and five via penalties 鈥 which sits third in the nation. Only Mississippi and Arkansas moved the chains more often.
First downs don鈥檛 perfectly correlate to points, but consistently picking them up bodes well from an efficiency standpoint. The Tigers are also third among teams that have played two games in third down conversion rate, escaping from those scenarios 60.7 percent of the time.
That has allowed Mizzou to find success even when deep passes fall incomplete early in a set of downs. Starting the year with efficiency over explosiveness could also be an indication of what returning significant parts of last season鈥檚 offense can do for MU.
鈥淭hat鈥檚 a sign of growth and maturity from all of us on the offensive side of the ball,鈥 Drinkwitz said. 鈥淲e all want it now for instant gratification. We all want explosive plays. You鈥檇 rather be on SportsCenter for that than, you know, three yards in a cloud of dust or five-yard hitches.
鈥淏ut the reality of what we鈥檙e figuring out is that teams don鈥檛 really want to give up explosive plays versus our wide receiver corps, so we have to be willing to make them defend us in a different manner,鈥 he continued. 鈥淎nd I think our offensive staff in the first two games has done a really good job of figuring out what the defensive plan against us was, and then even having to come up with stuff that maybe wasn鈥檛 in the game plan that we know defeats this or defeats that.鈥
Because a ranked power conference team is coming to Columbia on Saturday, the time for Mizzou鈥檚 offense to show off its firepower is rapidly approaching. If Missouri is going to assemble a resume worthy of a spot in the 12-team College Football Playoff, it would be well served to pick up a win against team No. 24 in the AP Poll.
Entering Week 3, only three Football Bowl Subdivision teams had played a weaker set of first two opponents than the Tigers, according to ESPN鈥檚 strength of schedule metrics: Toledo, Rutgers and Navy.
But between this weekend鈥檚 slate and the end of the season, there are only 13 FBS programs with tougher schedules than Missouri.
That鈥檚 significant. While the CFP Selection Committee isn鈥檛 sorting teams by ESPN strength of schedule rating and then picking 12, strong records tend to indicate which 鈥渂ubble鈥 teams would make the expanded playoff field. As things stand now, Missouri has a chance to make a statement down the stretch after dominating the opponents it needed to early on.
That starts with cleaning up details in Saturday鈥檚 intriguing clash with Boston College.