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Monday takeaway: Evaluating Mizzou’s O-Line struggles

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Prior to Missouri’s game against Ole Miss last week, head coach Barry Odom challenged his offensive line. The Tigers had struggled to generate much push in the running game at times during the first five games of the season, and as a result, the line became a carousel of sorts, with seven players starting at least once in the first five games and the Tigers using a different starting configuration for each contest.

But against the Rebels, finally, Missouri used the same starting five linemen in the same five spots as it had the week before. And after Odom’s challenge, the group played well. Missouri ran the ball at will against a talented defensive front, amassing 233 yards and three touchdowns on the ground and averaging 5.4 yards per carry. When the Tigers got the ball with 5:51 remaining in the fourth quarter, they were able to sustain a drive long enough to run the clock out. After the game, Odom called it the best performance of the season for the offensive line.

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Missouri's offensive line figured to be a strength this season but has struggled for much of the year in the running game.
Missouri's offensive line figured to be a strength this season but has struggled for much of the year in the running game. (Liv Paggiarino/ PowerMizzou)

Nothing changed from a personnel perspective in the following seven days. Missouri once again went with the same five starters up front: Larry Borom, Case Cook, Trystan Colon-Castillo, Tre’Vour Wallace-Simms and Yasir Durant from right to left. Yet against Vanderbilt, the offensive line followed up its best performance of the year with, arguably, its worst. The entire Tiger offense sputtered in a 21-14 loss.

After the game, Colon-Castillo, the team’s third-year starting center, put some blame for the loss on the shoulders of the line.

“I want to say we were playing pretty well, but if we were playing pretty well, then the scoreboard would be a little different,” he said.

Entering Saturday, the matchup of Missouri’s offensive line against Vanderbilt’s defensive front would have appeared favorable for the Tigers. Vanderbilt entered the weekend ranked last in the SEC in every major defensive category. The Commodores allowed their previous two opponents, Ole Miss and UNLV, to run for a combined 619 yards on 6.4 yards per carry. They ranked tied for No. 103 nationally in tackles for loss, averaging five per game, and tied for 108th in sacks at 1.25 per game.

That same Vanderbilt defense held Missouri to 3.8 yards per carry and 153 total yards on the ground Saturday. The Tiger tailbacks accounted for just over half, 81, of those yards. And the Commodores recorded three sacks and eight tackles for loss that cost Missouri a grand total of 49 yards.

Asked about the performance after the game, one of Odom’s first remarks was that the offense struggled to overcome its lack of success on the ground. Because it was able to stop the Tiger rushing attack on early downs, Vanderbilt frequently forced Missouri into obvious passing situations on third downs, and quarterback Kelly Bryant struggled in those situations.

On Missouri’s 15 third downs, it faced an average distance of 10.4 yards. The Tigers converted just three of those opportunities into third downs.

“You get on those third and long situations, it’s basically the whole defense knows it’s pass, the whole stadium knows it’s pass,” Colon-Castillo said. “They’re ready to tee off and try to get after the quarterback. So not being able to run the ball on first and second down, especially early on, was really a big problem for us.”

Penalties, too, put the Tigers behind the chains at times. The whole team appeared penalty prone, drawing 12 total flags for 120 yards, and the offensive line was not immune. Two penalties from the group, a holding call on Borom and an illegal hands to the face flag on Wallace-Simms, put the Tigers in second or third and long and led directly to punts.

“You look at 120 yards of penalties, we won’t beat anybody when we do that,” Odom said. “We’ve got to take a hard, long look at that.”

Larry Rountree III and the Missouri running backs ran for just 81 combined yards on 24 carries against Vanderbilt.
Larry Rountree III and the Missouri running backs ran for just 81 combined yards on 24 carries against Vanderbilt. (USA Today Sports Images)

Somewhat surprisingly, Saturday was not the first time Missouri has struggled to create room for its rushing attack this season. Entering the year, the offensive line figured to be a strength. The Tigers returned three players with at least two years of starting experience in Durant, Wallace-Simms and Colon-Castillo, and both Borom and Cook, who have come to man the final two starting spots among the group, are in their third season in the program. With that group paving the way for a returning 1,200-yard rusher in Larry Rountree III and a mobile quarterback in Bryant, offseason optimism for Missouri’s rushing attack ran high.

Yet according to Pro Football Focus, Missouri’s run blocking grade ranks 86th nationally and 10th out of 14 teams in the SEC. An inability to create holes in the running game loomed large in both of the team’s losses; Saturday’s defeat and the Week One loss at Wyoming represent the team’s two lowest rushing outputs on the season.

“Games are won in the trenches, so if we’re not executing with running the ball, it immediately makes the game a lot harder,” tight end Albert Okwuegbunam said.

That Missouri’s offensive line struggled against Vanderbilt, especially in its run blocking, is clear. The cause of those struggles is more difficult to discern. Odom and his players struggled to articulate specific reasons for the slow offensive performance after the game, saying they would have to watch the film. Odom suggested the blame lay with both players and coaches.

“I think it’s a combination of all guys,” he said. “I’d be foolish to make a lot of comments right now without understanding what I saw, but I think it was all involved, including coaching.”

Durant brought up another possible explanation, which echoed his teammates’ words following the Wyoming loss. After that initial game of the season, Colon-Castillo had said Missouri failed to match Wyoming’s intensity, especially after jumping out to a 14-0 lead. Six weeks later, Durant said Vanderbilt simply came ready to play, and the Tigers did not.

“It was just a matter of not executing,” Durant said. “Vanderbilt, they were a better team than us. They came ready to play. And tonight they were just the better team.”

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