Just about every time Missouri football coach Eli Drinkwitz has spoken to reporters since his team kicked off spring practices last month, he’s fielded a question about Luther Burden — to the point of obvious annoyance. Drinkwitz has consistently complimented Burden, the nation’s No. 1 wide receiver and No. 4 overall prospect in the 2022 recruiting class. But Drinkwitz has also tried to guard against hyping up the East St. Louis product too much, or not speaking highly of the other receivers on the team. Last Tuesday, all Drinkwitz had to say when asked about Burden was “he’s a good player.”

Saturday, during Missouri’s spring game, Burden lived up to the hype. In his first game in a Tiger uniform, he gained 81 yards as a receiver, 15 as a rusher and scored a touchdown.

But the game also showed that Missouri’s wide receiver room is more than just Burden. In fact, Burden wasn’t even the leading receiver to come from his high school. Sophomore Dominic Lovett led all Missouri players with 127 total yards — 109 as a receiver and 18 as a rusher. Lovett also scored a touchdown.

“He’s very competitive, and so when another receiver from East St. Louis was catching passes, I think he definitely wanted to show his work too, and he definitely did that,” Drinkwitz said of Lovett.

Lovett and Burden were two of the eight Missouri wide receivers who caught passes Saturday and two of four who scored touchdowns. With the addition of Burden into the mix and players like Lovett and junior Chance Luper having another offseason under their belt, Drinkwitz is optimistic that Missouri can get more out of its receiving corps in 2022.

“I think the guys out on the perimeter really stepped up and made plays,” he said. “Chance Luper made plays, JJ Hester made plays. Tauskie Dove continues to make plays. Luther Burden made plays. Barrett Banister made, I think, the go-ahead touchdown catch, if I remember right. So I was very impressed with the way the whole thing played out.”

Lovett showed glimpses of what he could do a season ago. He appeared in all 13 games as a true freshman, starting six of them. But his production tailed off as the season progressed. Across Missouri’s final five games, he caught a total of six passes for just four yards and rushed the ball once for 15.

Drinkwitz blamed himself for Lovett’s freshman struggles, saying the coaching staff asked him to do too much. Lovett has been playing exclusively in the slot during the spring, and Drinkwitz believes the simplicity has allowed the game to slow down for him.

“I think we tried to do too much too fast with Dominic,” Drinkwitz said. “I think we tried to move him around way too much and didn’t let him settle into just getting good at something and then growing his opportunities from there. At the end of the day I was too greedy. And I think for him he’s played slot receiver the entire spring, and he’s trying to develop at that position and be consistent at that position, taking a consistent approach every day. And I think it’s really paid off for him.”

Lovett did most of his damage Saturday after the catch. He turned a bubble screen into a 62-yard gain after reversing field and his touchdown came when he caught a push pass from Tyler Macon behind the line of scrimmage and scampered 18 yards into the end zone.

Meanwhile, another player who vanished toward the end of last season had a strong spring game in Luper. In 2021, Luper caught 21 passes for 203 yards and a touchdown across Missouri’s first seven games. He never caught another pass.

Saturday, catching passes from Brady Cook, the majority of Luper’s production came down the field. He scored on a 52-yard touchdown and also made an impressive back-shoulder catch down the sideline. Perhaps his most impressive grab didn’t actually count, as he couldn’t get a foot in bounds, but only after he went up and made an acrobatic snag along the sideline. Luper finished the game with 72 yards and a score.

Veterans Dove and Banister also found the end zone, Dove when he high-pointed a deep ball from Macon and Banister after he caught a short pass from Cook in the flat, juked a defender and dove for the pylon. All in all, Drinkwitz was pleased with the balanced production from his pass-catchers. He wants the group to continue to balance competing against one another with being unselfish, and believes that could result in a more potent passing game next fall.

“Just the growth of that position, people maturing, coming along,” Drinkwitz said. “Understanding for us in our pass game it’s about being detailed, disciplined and unselfish. And those are three heavy words, and you’ve got to embrace all three of them in order to be successful in the pass game. And I think those guys are doing that. And there’s good competition. I think they feed off each other.”

It wasn’t just the wide receivers who pleased Drinkwitz Saturday. Speaking to reporters Monday for the first time since the spring game, he said he was pleasantly surprised by the lack of penalties on both sides of the ball. He also specifically shouted out a few players: running backs Nate Peat, Taj Butts and Cody Schrader; defensive linemen Darius Robinson, Isaiah McGuire, Arden Walker and Realus George and linebacker Devin Nicholson.

Overall, Drinkwitz said the defense had a decent showing considering it had “one hand tied behind its back.” After just three weeks working with new defensive coordinator Blake Baker, the defenses for both spring squads weren’t allowed to blitz or disguise coverages, which gave the offense the upper hand. Drinkwitz did, however, feel like the defense got pushed around a bit too easily at the point of attack, especially as drives progressed.

“I do think that the point of attack on the defensive side of the ball, especially when guys got tired, after the first first down of a drive, was something that we’re going to have to continue to work on,” Drinkwitz said. “I think part of that is being able to continue to rotate fresh bodies in the game.”

The most scrutinized position, of course, was quarterback, where Cook and Macon are the only scholarship players currently on the Missouri roster. Drinkwitz said he saw some good plays and some bad plays from both. Cook completed 16-20 passes for 191 yards and three touchdowns, while Macon went 16-23 for 233 yards and a score. Cook threw one interception and Macon threw two, the first of which was returned for a touchdown. Drinkwitz said cutting down turnovers like those will be a point of emphasis moving forward.

“Obviously both of them had some mistakes that they’re going to have to grow from and learn from, and that’s part of it,” Drinkwitz said of his quarterbacks. “It’s better to make that mistake in the spring game than in the course of a game, but both of them really made mistakes that really put you behind the 8-ball on trying to win a game, so we gotta learn from those and grow from those. Brady had the red zone turnover that took points off the board, and obviously Maco had the two turnovers, one of them a pick-six that ultimately cost his team dearly.”

While Cook and Macon were playing quarterback on the field Saturday, another quarterback watched the spring game from the stands. Georgia transfer JT Daniels officially visited Missouri over the weekend. He has also visited Oregon State and plans to take a trip to West Virginia, as well.

Drinkwitz has repeatedly emphasized that the coaching staff isn’t going to shy away from adding competition to the quarterback room via the transfer portal. He’s taking the same approach at other positions, too. Drinkwitz said he expects another wave of players to hit the portal as programs around the country conclude spring practices, and he’ll keep his eye out for players who might be able to help the Tigers. Missouri also hosted Ole Miss defensive back transfer Keidron Smith over the weekend.

“Just keep my Twitter account hot and ready to roll,” Drinkwitz said. “I think the new norm of college football is going to be that you’re going to have cycles at the end of the year, at the end of the playing season, and then you’re going to have cycles at the end of the spring season. … Obviously our job as the head football coach at the University of Missouri is to do whatever we can do to improve our opportunity to win the SEC East. So should there be a player that we believe would add value to our program, both from a culture perspective and a performance perspective, then absolutely we will consider those guys and have the flexibility within our signing class to do that.”

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