Mizzou Football head coach Barry Odom said during his weekly press conference that he was happy with the team in its effort against Memphis last Saturday in a 65-33 win.
"I'm proud our team found a way to get a win," Odom said. "We had some crucial times during the game where we grew up a little bit."
Despite the big win, Coach Odom knows there is no time to let up as Mizzou welcomes an SEC East division foe to Columbia in the form of the Kentucky Wildcats this Saturday, Oct. 27. Kentucky is currently ranked 12 in the AP poll and 14 in the Coaches poll.
?? "We understand the importance of playing our best ball. Every game from here on out will be decided in the fourth quarter."
— Mizzou Football (@MizzouFootball) October 23, 2018
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"We've got a great Kentucky team coming in on Saturday. They're 6-1 for a reason. They run the ball extremely well, they play great defense, and they're very well coached."
Odom praised Kentucky's head coach, Mark Stoops, for what he has done with the program in the time he has been given.
"Mark has done a good of job as anybody could do with the time he's been given to build that program. He's got his stamp all over it. He's got a team that's playing as good of football as anybody in the country."
The rushing attack plays a major part in the Kentucky offense. The Kentucky rushing offense currently ranks third in the conference and No. 22 in the country. Junior RB Benny Snell Jr. is the leader of the rushing attack for Kentucky.
"I think each week you go into the things that the other team does really well and with Kentucky, obviously both of their tailbacks find ways to attack you. Every week there's a different tweak in what they do to have success. Benny (Snell) is as good as there is in the country. He's a strong, powerful guy that when it looks like there's not anything there and you turn around and he's broken off a way to get 20 yards."
Kentucky's defense has also been a major part of the Wildcats' success this season. Kentucky's total defense ranks second in the conference and 13 in the country. They are also second in the country in point allowed per game with 12.6.
"Just looking down statistically, rushing defense in our league they're second, total defense they're second and scoring defense they're No. 1. They do a great job on being aggressive and almost suffocating in coverage. They're an older group and it looks like they've played together and it shows up in the way that they play. They're as good of a defense as we've seen."
Mizzou players looking to build on their success in the game against Memphis are senior QB Drew Lock, sophomore TE Albert Okwuegbunam, and freshman WR Jalen Knox.
Lock passed for 350 yards going 23-29 with four touchdowns. Odom mentioned that he noticed Lock showed maturity in certain parts of the game against Memphis.
"I think one of the best plays Drew had the other day was the fourth and one play and it was a dynamic catch by Jonathon Johnson to end up coming up with the ball. The throw might have been there when he rolled out, but he waited just a minute because there wasn't a clean throw. He trusted long enough that we were going to have it protected and that one of the receivers was going to work their way to getting open. That shows signs of having belief in what the play call was, but also believing in himself on waiting for it to clear up and then make the throw."
Odom continued on another play Lock had during the game, "There was another one coming to our bench, I think it was on a second down and everything was covered and instead of trying to force one or throw back across his body, he just threw it out of bounds. Those are things that you want your quarterback to do. I think he's got a very, very good comfort level right now, maybe even a lot more than it was three weeks ago."
Okwuegbunam was one of Lock's favorite targets during the game against Memphis. The Mizzou tight end capitalized on the volume of targets he saw and had his best game of the season to this point. He finished with six receptions for 159 yards and three touchdowns.
"I think he played better and also some of that had to do with some of things specifically going into the game plan. We thought we were going to get a one-on-one matchups a couple times based on formation and we did and then Drew was able to get him the ball. Albert played a lot more consistently, he ran better routes, and he played his best game up to this point."
Knox also saw Lock target him multiple times throughout the game. Knox finished the game with five receptions for 104 yards and a touchdown. Odom said Knox has handled the heightened role in the offense with maturity.
"The understanding that how he practices is how he's going to play; he'll make a big play and set the football down and run back for the next play. There's not time for celebration. He spends a lot of time on watching video outside of the time that we require him to do it. Most of the time you're teaching guys how to watch film, you're teaching guys and giving them opportunities to learn all the processes to what it takes to play and play at a high level. He was brought up that way I guess because he got it the first day he walked in the door here."
While Mizzou was able to come out with win of a large margin against Memphis, one aspect of the game they struggled in was penalties. Mizzou committed season-high 12 penalties for a total of 122 yards.
"You look at the penalties we committed last week and you show those to your guys. Number one, as a staff we evaluate and critique them all. What can we do better as coaches to make sure we don't commit those penalties? If you have a penalty in practice then you're going to do the same thing on Saturday. We've got a little bit of awareness training that has gone into play for guys that commit penalties and hopefully that makes them aware not to do it again. That's like extra running, it's code word for kicking their tail in."