Missouri Prepares for Florida

The Missouri Tigers football team is traveling to Gainesville to take on the No. 11 Florida Gators this Saturday. This SEC matchup will kick off at 4 p.m. ET in Ben Hill Griffin Stadium. Coverage of the game will be on SEC Network.

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Heading into this matchup, the Tigers are 4-4 on their season and 0-4 in conference play. The Gators have a record of 6-2 and 4-2 in conference play.

Last Season’s Matchup

The Tigers destroyed the Gators 45-16 last year at home. This win was part of Missouri’s 6-game winning streak to close their regular season. This win was during a time when Florida’s football program was beginning to collapse. Florida had an interim head coach in place, Randy Shannon, after the firing of Jim McElwain, and Malik Zaire was the starting quarterback for the game.

One week prior to this game, the Gators were dominated by the Georgia Bulldogs, 42-7. Missouri is hoping history repeats itself this weekend. The Gators are currently coming off a 36-17 loss against Georgia.

However, with Dan Mullen as Florida’s head coach, the Gators look like a completely different team this season.

Odom Discusses Gators Offense

While preparing for this upcoming game, Mizzou head coach Barry Odom talked a lot about the Gators offense.

“Systematically, they’re doing a nice job on using the skill set of the guys that they got,” Odom said. “That’s your job as a coach, to find a what your guys can do and then go install it and put them in position to go play.”

Odom also says he’s impressed with Florida’s running backs junior Lamical Perine and redshirt junior Jordan Scarlett.

But what Odom is most impressed with is Florida’s down field passing game, whether it’s their play action game or in the drop back.

Odom also had praise for Florida’s quarterback Feleipe Franks.

Mizzou’s Season

The Tigers are coming off a 15-14 home loss against the No. 9 Kentucky Wildcats. Kentucky came back from a 14-3 deficit with 6 minutes left in the game. This loss marked Missouri’s fourth loss of the season. The Tigers have only had wins against UT Martin, Purdue, Wyoming, and Memphis so far this season.

Despite these losses, Tigers quarterback Drew Lock is making history. Lock has had 87 career passing touchdowns. That’s just one touchdown shy of Gator great Tim Tebow’s 88. Lock also has 10,839 career passing yards.

We’ll see if the Gators’ defense can stop him on Saturday to preserve Tebow’s record.