COLUMBIA, Missouri – Saturday’s game was full of 2024 firsts for the Missouri Tigers – a halftime deficit and an overtime loss.
Still, Missouri managed to give Faurot his fourth win of the season, thanks in large part to Nate Noel’s 199-yard rushing performance. Several errors and poor decisions hampered the passing game, but Brady Cook and Luther Burden III were able to score in overtime.
Here’s everything head coach Eli Drinkwitz said after the game:
Opening speech:
“Hats off to Coach Lea and his Vanderbilt Commodores football team. They’re a really tough football team, I knew they were coming here with something to prove, and they fought us… and fought and fought. But I’m really, really proud of our football team for finding a way to never give up, never back down. Every time we were behind, we came back and found a way to take the lead. We didn’t do what we wanted in the third and fourth quarters, we put the game away, we didn’t flinch, the defense allowed the first touchdown in overtime. Brady answers the first call with Luther, and then we find a way to win in overtime. The crowd was incredible the whole game, and they made the difference. I mean, we called the timeout, the student section, the band, the people on the mound, it was obviously a very tough situation for this young man, and I give all the credit to the fans. Proud to be 1-0 in the SEC.”
On the emotions after the game:
“I was really proud of the way our team fought. We didn’t even come close to playing our best game, but they just kept fighting. They just kept fighting for each other, they kept saying they supported each other, they grabbed Blake and told him they supported him. I’m proud of those guys for doing that.”
On Cook’s performance:
“It was 23 for 37 for 226 and two touchdowns. Obviously the three sacks are a problem. You know, (he’s) efficient. 1-0 in the SEC.”
About the fight against kickingS:
“Well, the first time, we had no choice. We had to score. And the second time, it’s just, you know, you just keep doing it. At the end of the day, we wanted to trust him. That’s a lesson, you can’t get too high and you can’t get too low. Last week, we were SEC Player of the Week. This week, we’re not, so we’re somewhere in the middle. Just like the rest of us, starting with me, we have to get better this week.”
On the decision to snap at the end of the first half:
“It’s all my fault. It was a really rash decision on my part and the team saved me. The bottom line is that I have to be much better. I should never have done that.”
About Blake Craig:
“The bottom line is he has to go between the uprights and the bottom line. There’s no response. We have to get better. I have to get better. He has to get better. We all have to get better. They didn’t go through the uprights, so I’m not frustrated with him. Like I told the team, we’re 4-0 and we’ve got a lot of work to do. There were some really positive things about the way we ran the football, but we definitely weren’t good enough in the red zone when we’re kicking that many field goals.”
On his conversation with Craig:
“My conversation with him was stop reacting emotionally and just go out there and do it. That’s what you have to do. You have to trust your training and your fundamentals and go out there and do it.”
About Nate Noel:
“Unbelievable. Obviously, he had the big run right in the third quarter. He’s a special player, I think we all noticed and knew that. We just have to keep finishing drives for him, you know? That’s the unfortunate thing right now. We’re just not able to finish drives in the red zone and we really have to take a hard look at what we can’t do in the red zone and why we’re not scoring touchdowns there. The three field goals, at the end of the day we should have scored touchdowns anyway. So that’s on us. And by ‘us’ I mean it’s on me.”
On Vanderbilt’s first touchdown:
“Just really bad play on defense. So we have to get a lot better.”
About Chuck Hicks:
“Chuck is a leader. He’s a captain, he’s consistent. Had a sack and never flinches.”
Zion Young said of the defensive line’s performance:
“I thought the defensive line played really well and applied pressure. The quarterback is really tough to tackle, 119 yards. A lot of that was on plays where we thought we had a guy to keep us in check. The last quarterback draw was obviously a really good run by him. On the option in the first half, we had two guys completely miss the tackle. But Zion Young played well, I thought.”
On Missouri’s role in dealing with Diego Pavia:
“Well, he ran for 119 yards, so it wasn’t as good as we needed it to be. At the end of the day, we’re all going to look back at the video and say we need to do a lot of things better. I thought our tackling angles were poor. I thought our first man in the running game didn’t tackle as well as we should have.”
On offensive success:
“On offense, we couldn’t score enough points to turn their game plan around, which was our goal all week: We wanted to get a two-point lead to force them to do something other than use the option. We didn’t do that.”
On Brady Cook’s running strength:
“He had a crucial first down right there in the third quarter. I’m not sure, I’ll have to go back and watch the tape. That was probably on me because I didn’t have a good play design. I thought our pass defense was OK. The sack we took in the fourth quarter, we were hot and that was on our play design. So I just have to correct that. But it wasn’t anything on the defense that I was upset about.”
News about Marquis Johnson and Brett Norfleet:
“Brett (Norfleet) just had a shoe issue. He just broke the bottom of the sole. Marquis (Johnson) has an ankle injury. I’ll get more updates as they come. Wasn’t able to return, but it wasn’t anything that required special attention. Good news for a week without playing.”
Lessons on extending redzone drives:
“I don’t think we did well in overtime when we got a field goal in the red zone. We need to take a hard look at what we’re doing in the red zone to figure out why we’re not sustaining drives and why we’re not converting third downs. So that’s on me as the head coach and I need to find better answers.”
On Luther Burden’s touchdown in the first quarter:
“We knew from the tape that they were overreacting to our perimeter and the great play design by Kirby (Moore). We put everything into the perimeter, which is a typical running formation for us and great action, great feint and great work by the quarterback.”
To prepare for Texas A&M’s week off:
“The last thing that anybody in this room, in the locker room, in my locker room, starting with me and my team, cares about is Texas A&M. We need to take a good look at the Missouri Tigers and figure out why we’re not making third downs in the red area, why we’re not kicking field goals, why we’re missing tackles, why we’re not doing our jobs. So I’m not even the least bit worried about Texas A&M.”
“We’ve done something since the first day of fall camp as far as making noise, so I’m not worried about that. What I’m worried about is our team is enjoying a win, 4-0, which is the best we can be record-wise, but playing-wise we’re not as good as we can be, and we’ve got to own up to that and figure out what we need to do to improve. It starts with me, and it starts with that being the message to the team, and that’s what we’re going to work on to improve. That’s how we’ve always handled off weeks, and that’s not going to change.”
