Not much went right in No. 13 Missouri’s 31-3 loss to No. 9 Ole Miss on Saturday. The Rebels handed the Tigers their second loss of conference play and held them to their lowest point total since Missouri’s 34-0 loss to Alabama in the 2024 season. Starting quarterback Austin Simmons failed to score a touchdown for the first time in his young Missouri career, and the Rebels got just about anything they wanted on the Tigers’ defense.
Without further ado, here’s what went “Wright” and what went wrong in Missouri’s loss to Ole Miss.
Wrong: Run Game
After back-to-back games of Jamal Roberts rushing for 200 or more yards, Missouri’s run game was due for some regression to the mean. But against an Ole Miss defense that had allowed an SEC-worst 176.4 rushing yards per game entering the contest, expecting another strong performance on the ground was well within reason.
Instead, Missouri rushed for a season-low 39 yards on just 1.5 yards per carry against the middling Rebels’ run defense. The heavy lifting then fell on Simmons and the pass game, which couldn’t quite get things going either.
“A lot of it could just be up-front things with movement, communication,” starting center Dominick Giudice said of what caused the struggles. “It's hard to say immediately what it is, but up front, we just got to do a better job of creating some type of hole for him.
Missouri coach Eli Drinkwitz said he’d need to “watch the tape” to identify what exactly went wrong with the blocking.
Wrong: Pass rush, run defense
Another seemingly super-strength of Missouri’s that evaporated against the Rebels: its pass rush.
Missouri pressured Ole Miss quarterback Trinidad Chambliss just four times. For reference, the Tigers logged double-digit pressures in all but one other game this season, pressuring Mississippi State dual-threat quarterback Kamario Taylor eight times in Week 4.
Missouri pressured Kansas quarterback Isaiah Marshall 40 times in Week 2 and pressured Aggie quarterback Marcel Reed 17 times in Week 6. Sophomore defensive tackle Donta Simpson had more pressures against Texas A&M (5) than all the Tigers combined against Ole Miss.
Similarly, Missouri’s run defense allowed two Rebel tailbacks to rush for 100 or more yards—ex-Tiger Kewan Lacy tallied 122 yards on 16 carries, and Makhi Frazier rushed for 101 yards on 15 carries.
Ole Miss finished with 257 yards on the ground, 29 more yards than Missouri allowed in its first three SEC games combined.
Wright: Sophomore pass-catchers
Wide receiver Donovan Olugbode went receptionless against Texas A&M, marking his first game without a catch since Missouri’s regular-season finale against Arkansas in 2025 in which then-starting quarterback Beau Pribula attempted seven passes and completed four.
Simmons made an effort to get Olugbode involved early against Ole Miss, finding him on his first dropback of the game and three total times in the first drive. Olugbode finished with a season-high nine receptions for a season-high 127 yards.
“Like we did in other games in the past, just really having that chemistry and talking about routes and concepts, what's going to be up in certain coverages,” Simmons said of what worked between the two against Ole Miss.”
Tight end Jude James filled in nicely for starter Brett Norfleet, who missed the contest with an injury. James hadn’t logged a reception all season entering the matchup but reeled in five balls for 57 yards, both of which became the most any Missouri tight end logged in a game so far this season.
With or without Norfleet’s presence, Missouri could look to involve James more for the remainder of the season.
Wrong: Empty-handed early
Missouri’s first trip to the red zone saw the Tigers leave with 3 points after penalties and a dropped touchdown put them in fourth-and-medium at goal-to-go. Its second trip resulted in starting kicker Blake Craig sailing one wide left from 23 yards out in the second quarter. The third time—although much, much later in the game—wasn’t the charm, as Simmons threw an interception to give the Rebels possession back, only needing kneels to end the game.
Missouri severely struggled to find its offensive footing after its first two red-zone failures.
“You got to score in the red zone and get everybody settled down, and we were never able to just get settled into the rhythm of the game,” Drinkwitz said.
With the exception of its two SEC wins, Missouri has put itself in early deficits. It failed to come back from either in both its SEC losses.
Wright: Parity in the SEC is ever-prominent
The loss, as lopsided as it was, doesn't mark a nail in the coffin for Missouri's College Football Playoff hopes. Each team in the SEC has extremely impressive wins and equally embarassing losses.
This week in the SEC alone: No. 1 Georgia lost 27-24 to unranked Auburn, No. 6 Alabama lost 26-10 to No. 14 Tennessee and No. 7 Texas lost 27-24 to unranked Florida.
Florida was blown out by Missouri and South Carolina each of the prior two games, while Tennessee played a close contest with Arkansas the game before thumping Alabama and Auburn's only SEC win was against Vanderbilt before it beat the Dawgs.
Point being: Missouri's loss to Ole Miss is recoverable, especially in the SEC. Its games against Texas and Georgia both look more winnable than they did before the weekend.
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