First glimpse of Bryant shows a lot to like
Four months after he put the Missouri football program in national headlines by choosing to transfer to the school over the likes of Arkansas, Florida and Mississippi State, Kelly Bryant finally donned a Tiger uniform Saturday. The new starting quarterback has been the dominant storyline all spring, so it made sense that on the first play of the Black and Gold game, offensive coordinator Derek Dooley called for a pass. Bryant caught a shotgun snap, rolled to his right and fired a completion to Jalen Knox.
The rest of Bryant’s time on the field went similarly. The graduate transfer from Clemson showed off his mobility — even though defenders couldn’t tackle him — and his accuracy. Following the completion to Knox, Bryant hit on seven of his next eight passes. Though Saturday’s contest was only a scrimmage, his performance should only increase the high expectations Tiger fans have harbored for this season since he announced on Dec. 4 he would be coming to Missouri.
Bryant didn’t appear for requested interviews after the scrimmage, but his coaches and teammates say fans saw what they have been seeing throughout spring practices.
“He’s been playing like that all spring, been playing well, so that was a good sight to see,” offensive tackle Yasir Durant said of Bryant. “He kept on playing good.”
Bryant quarterbacked the Black team, comprised of Missouri’s first- and second-team players. He faced a Gold defense made up largely of reserves, so that certainly didn’t hurt his stat line. Still, Bryant looked sharp in the early action, completing all three of his attempts on the opening drive of the game, which went 75 yards in six plays and was capped by a Larry Rountree III touchdown. The Black unit made it into the red zone on the following two drives as well, but both ended in missed field goals from inside of 30 yards.
Bryant struggled a bit in the red zone, missing on both of his pass attempts inside the 20-yard line, but it's worth noting he didn't have starting tight end Albert Okwuegbunam or slot receiver Johnathon Johnson in the game. Okwuegbunam has remained limited from a shoulder injury suffered during last season, and Johnson sat out the scrimmage due to hamstring soreness. Bryant finished 12 of 17 for 150 yards.
The majority of his completions came on short, quick routes, but he also showed an ability to extend plays and throw the deep ball. On one play, Bryant dropped back, found no receivers open, scrambled away from pressure and hit slot receiver Barrett Banister for a first down. His most impressive throw of the day came when he hit fellow graduate transfer Jonathan Nance down the sideline with a perfectly placed pass that resulted in a 25-yard gain. Head coach Barry Odom said Bryant will be even more difficult for defenses to handle when he’s allowed to run the ball and break tackles.
“Kelly is a little bit different at the quarterback position when we’re not playing two-hand touch,” Odom said. “He’s a hard guy to bring down, he’s going to help extend some plays.”
“I know a lot of people probably can’t tackle him one on one, so we’ll see in the game how that goes,” Nance added. “People will think they’re tackling him, but they’re not tackling him.”
Nance, who announced he would transfer from Arkansas to Missouri on the same day Bryant publicized his decision, has shown perhaps the best rapport with Bryant so far this spring. Saturday, he caught three passes for 48 yards. He said he was eager Saturday to show fans the connection the two have developed, as well as his ability to stretch the field vertically.
“These last few scrimmages before we got to the spring game, we’ve been making some good completions, so I feel like it all just transitioned and carried over to the spring game,” Nance said.
Being that Saturday was simply a scrimmage against the third-team defense, Odom admitted that the offense didn’t show much from its typical playbook. But both he and Dooley said they have been perhaps more impressed with Bryant’s ability to soak in a new offensive system as they have the physical abilities he showed off Saturday. In fact, Odom said the offense currently has more components installed than it did at the end of spring practices a year ago.
“Certainly when you have a new quarterback who is just now getting dropped on campus, that’s a work in progress,” Dooley said. “I was pleased. You could really see Kelly improving. He really had his best week the last week, so that’s encouraging as you roll into the summer.”
More than anything, the Black and Gold game provided an opportunity for Missouri to show off its new quarterback to the public and galvanize enthusiasm for next season. Bryant appeared to embrace the moment. Once he finished playing for the day, he talked and laughed with his teammates on the sidelines. At one point, he and Rountree did a TV interview with an ESPNU sideline reporter in which Bryant complimented a commentator’s outfit and cracked jokes about the empty West bleachers behind him (fans all sat on the West side of the stadium).
Add that to the list of compliments his teammates offered about Bryant Saturday: He’s personable. Nance described Bryant as a “people-person.” Dooley said that’s an important trait for the leader of an offense.
“A big component of it is him getting to know the guys on the team,” Dooley said. “It’s hard to lead a team when you don’t know them very well.”
Between his play on the field and the personality he showed off it, Bryant surely increased the hype for next season. He, too, is optimistic that Missouri can build off its eight-win campaign from 2018.
“The ceiling is high for this group,” he told a Missouri spokesperson. “We’ve had a bunch of guys hwo have been out. I’m looking forward to getting those guys back and just getting that chemistry with those guys in the summer. So like I said, the ceiling is high, but we just have to take it one day at a time."