In Gator Bowl loss, Mizzou's young offense flashes promise amid pitfalls

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — The end hurt badly.

On Saturday night, many Mizzou players took off their jerseys for the final time after a 13-7 loss in the Gator Bowl. Some, like Daylan Carnell and Connor Tollison, had played for the Tigers long enough to know what a losing season felt like, making the end a little more bitter.

“Dissapointed for the seniors,” coach Eli Drinkwitz said. “Connor, the way he’s played and performed here for the amount of time he’s been here. For Zion (Young), for those guys. This is going to stick with me for a while, not doing enough to help them find a way to win.”

The tenured players, many of whom were on defense, had ups and downs. Mizzou’s front seven stuffed the run effectively early on. Carnell and Khalil Jacobs combined for 13 tackles, and Mizzou’s experienced cornerbacks didn’t allow many big plays in pass coverage.

Mizzou was far from perfect defensively, giving up a 19-play touchdown drive that took more than 10 minutes off the clock in the third quarter. The defense also only had one sack and four tackles for loss.

But they gave the offense a chance. The problem was that the offense couldn’t seize it.

Like the defense, the unit had its own ups and downs. Unlike the defense, the offense was mostly led by nonseniors, and their downs weighed much more than their ups.

They were 3 of 12 on third down, had five offensive drives yielding less than 10 yards and tallied the first bowl game since the 1969 season in which they scored under 10 points (the Tigers have played 26 bowl games since).

As for positives, start with running back Ahmad Hardy, who broke Mizzou’s single-season rushing record held by Cody Schrader, who had 1,627 rushing yards in 2023. He finished with 89 rushing yards on 15 carries; for the season, he finished with 1,649 yards.

But Hardy didn’t break the record until there were almost four minutes left in the fourth quarter, mostly because of the ’Hoos hogging the ball for much of the second half.

“It wasn’t designed that way,” Drinkwitz said of Hardy’s lack of usage in the second half.

Jamal Roberts also had 56 rushing yards on 11 carries.

In general, however, Mizzou’s offense flopped outside of a silky-smooth seven-play, 74-yard touchdown drive on its opening possession.

In just his third start of the season, Matt Zollers had arguably the most drastic gap between highlights and lowlights of any Mizzou player. He finished with 12 completions on 22 attempts for 101 yards and an interception.

He completed his first three passes for 33 yards, but he couldn’t get into a rhythm after that. His rocket arm was firing bullets all evening, but sometimes he had too much sizzle, as some passes zipped by open receivers. Others just missed the mark.

Similar to the Texas A&M game, Zollers also had a critical turnover. When he tried to fit a pass into air-tight coverage on Xavier Loyd late in the third quarter, the ball was tipped, and a diving Emmanuel Karnley secured an interception.

Zollers almost made up for his mistakes on Mizzou’s final drive of regulation, completing four of his first five passes to put Mizzou on the cusp of the red zone. The fourth completion was a 24-yard howitzer to Donovan Olugbode with under 30 seconds left.

“A lot to build on,” Drinkwitz said of Zollers’ performance. “Everybody’s got to grow and learn from their reps. That’s his third start ... . I thought he did some really good things. Obviously, wish we could have that interception back.”

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His crunch-time efforts mirrored his performance against Vanderbilt, when he made a handful of clutch throws that kept Mizzou alive late in the fourth quarter, even as the Tigers ended up falling to the Commodores.

Unfortunately for Zollers, the referees decided that he had to exit the game before a game-deciding fourth-and-10. The back of his head had bounced off the turf on a hit after a third-down throwaway.

Redshirt junior Brett Brown, who’d never attempted a pass prior to Saturday night, was tasked with succeeding on the game’s biggest play. His prayer to the front left corner of the end zone was almost corralled by Daniel Blood, but he couldn’t hang on to the pigskin through traffic.

For Zollers, it was a disspointing end for the freshman quarterback who seemed to finally find a groove again.

“I thought he gave us an opportunity,” Drinkwitz said of Zollers, “and that’s all you could ask for. It’s really on me. I didn’t do a good enough job of calling plays for him.”

His primary target was Donovan Olugbode, who was Mizzou’s top pass-catcher by default with a depleted depth chart. Marquis Johnson, Josh Manning and James Madison weren’t with the team, as they intend to enter the transfer portal once it opens Friday.

Kevin Coleman Jr., MU’s leading receiver in the regular season, had reportedly been battling an illness leading up to the Gator Bowl and only had 22 total yards. Tight end Brett Norfleet, Mizzou’s second-leading pass-catcher in the regular season, missed the Gator Bowl with a shoulder injury.

Olugbode didn’t stuff the stat sheet, coming away with just five receptions for 49 yards. But both stats, along with 10 targets, led the team.

So, now what?

From a bird’s-eye view, the offense gave outsiders an appetizer for what next season could look like.

On one hand, there’s clear promise with Mizzou’s prospective trio of Zollers, Hardy and Olugbode. Zollers has a live arm and advanced traits for a player as young as he is.

“I like his progression,” Hardy said. “As a freshman, he’s very mature.”

Hardy established himself as one of the best running backs in college football, while Olugbode has made big-time plays in numerous games.

On the other hand, it’s difficult to assess what the 2026 season will look like in December 2025. The transfer portal, where Mizzou has acquired much of its production on both sides of the ball in recent seasons, won’t open for a few more days.

Zollers just completed his true freshman season, where plenty of eventually great quarterbacks endured growing pains (i.e., Drew Lock in 2015). Plus, Drinkwitz called plays on offense, which might not be the case next season with Chip Lindsey joining MU as its new offensive coordinator after spending this past season at Michigan.

What the offense will look like in August remains to be seen. But Zollers, Hardy and Olugbode offered light at the end of the tunnel against Virginia, even as darkness prevailed Saturday night.