Five highlights from Missouri Tigers spring football game with standouts, story lines
The Missouri Tigers football team played its annual spring game on Saturday afternoon.
The teams were picked by the players in a draft earlier this week. Team Mizzou (black), which was led by senior captains Barrett Banister and Isaiah McGuire, defeated the Tigers (gold), who were led by senior captains Darius Robinson and Connor Wood, 35-34.
There were no live kickoffs or punts and no quarterback hits were allowed from the defense, but outside of that it was a pretty standard game format.
Here are some highlights from the afternoon The team didn’t allow postgame interviews, and there were no live stats. Unofficial stats were provided afterwards.
Five-star Luther Burden came to campus as the second-highest rated recruit in school history, with lots of lofty expectations on his young shoulders. The wide receiver lived up to the hype on Saturday, showing off his versatility on numerous occasions. He finished with 81 yards and a touchdown.
Defensive back Daylan Carnell was the clear defensive standout of the day. Carnell, a redshirt freshman and former four-star recruit, forced two turnovers. He intercepted Tyler Macon’s first and last passes of the afternoon, even managing to return the first one for a touchdown. Macon completed 16 of 23 passes for 233 yards and one touchdown to the two interceptions.
The competition for the starting quarterback spot was a big story line coming into the spring game. Especially with Georgia transfer JT Daniels on campus for a visit. Brady Cook had one interception (by Clemson transfer Joseph Charleston), but outside of that he looked like the better quarterback throughout the game. Cook completed 16 of 20 passes for 191 yards and three touchdowns, including this deep ball to Chance Luper.
It wasn’t just Burden who impressed on Saturday; the entire wide receiver unit showed out. Dominic Lovett had a great performance, at one point taking a screen pass over 60 yards and then scoring a touchdown a few plays later. He finished with 109 yards to lead the unit. Luper (72 yards), Tauskie Dove (91 yards) and Banister (25 yards) all made some eye-catching plays too. Missouri clearly has a lot of talent and depth at this position.
The passing game took center stage, but the running back unit had some moments that showed potential as well. Stanford transfer Nate Peat showed some explosive ability with this 23-yard touchdown run, and he finished with 30 yards. Cody Schrader, a walk-on transfer from Truman State, made some nice plays in the second half and led with 68 rushing yards.
This story was originally published March 19, 2022 at 6:13 PM.
