(Photo Credit: USA Today Sports)
Sweet redemption. That’s what it felt like Saturday night for the Missouri Tigers and their fans as they were able to pull out the late 21-20 win over the 13th ranked Gamecocks. The win comes a year removed from the Tigers gut wrenching double over time loss to South Carolina when Missouri kicker Andrew Baggett shanked a field goal off the left upright giving the Tigers their lone regular season loss. Fittingly enough it was Baggett, who sealed the deal this time around with the extra point to give Missouri the win 21-20.
The game started off swimmingly for the Tigers as the defense forced a quick fourth down. South Carolina head coach Steve Spurrier elected to go for it, but failed turning the ball over to Missouri. Maty Mauk went right to work completing a pair of passes to Bud Sasser before Russell Hansbrough finished the drive with an 18-yard touchdown run to give the Tigers a quick 7-0 lead.
The Missouri defense came up with another stop on the Gamecocks second drive of the game, but was unable to take advantage of good field position as Baggett missed on a 48-yard field goal attempt. Had he connected on the 48-yard field goal it would have been a career long. Baggett’s longest field goal of his career is 46-yards, which he hit against Arizona State and Syracuse during his freshman season.
South Carolina worked the ball down the field after taking over on downs and was able to get on the board with a 33-yard field goal from Elliot Fry cutting the Missouri lead to 7-3.
Throughout the rest of the half it was a defensive battle with both teams doing an excellent job of limiting the quarterbacks to develop any sort of rhythm. On the Missouri side the presence of Marcus Golden made all the difference. Golden, who sat out lasts weeks contest after suffering a hamstring injury in practice, forced the issue against quarterback Dylan Thompson. The Missouri defensive line was able to get to Thompson as defensive end Shane Ray tallied two more sacks on the evening to push his total to eight for the season through the first five games. The all time record for sacks in a single season is 11.5 held by Aldon Smith and Michael Sam.
On the Gamecocks side they were able to disrupt Mauk all night long. The defensive unit, which ranked last in the SEC was having an outstanding night until the Tigers late fourth quarter run. Mauk looked out of sorts as they used several quarterback spy plays and a number of different coverage’s to shut down the aerial attack. The Tiger offense wasn’t helped by the fact that they were missing two of their big three wide outs in Darius White and Jimmie Hunt, who both sat out with injuries.
South Carolina took the lead late in the first half as Mike Davis galloped into the end zone for a 17-yard touchdown giving the Gamecocks a 10-7 advantage. Davis carried the ball 22 times for 104-yards and a touchdown. The 17-yard touchdown run was Davis’ longest of the day. At the half the Gamecocks held the three-point advantage with the score remaining at 10-7.
Coming out of the break the Tigers looked to ramp it up a notch, but that didn’t happen as they went three and out on their opening drive. The Gamecocks extended their lead later in the third when Fry hit a 41-yard field goal pushing the South Carolina lead to 13-7. Christian Brinser, the Missouri punter, played a big role in this game as he recorded 10 punts on the contest. Brinser’s contribution coupled with the defense helped keep the Tigers in it throughout the second half as they continued to struggle offensively.
With 7:25 left to play Thompson hit Pharoh Cooper on a 23-yard connection resulting in a touchdown. The magnificent catch by Cooper extended the Gamecocks lead to 20-7 following the PAT.
Things started looking bleak for the Tigers down by 13; Mauk on the other hand had other ideas. After a great return by Marcus Murphy Mauk hit Sasser on a 41-yard gain setting up the offense in Gamecock territory. He then connected with Wesley Leftwich for a 26-yard gain before Hansbrough found the end zone for his second touchdown of the game cutting the deficit to 20-14. The entire drive took just 35 seconds off the clock.
After a huge stop by the Missouri defense and with timing running low head coach Gary Pinkel opted for the ground attack. Murphy and Hansbrough were able to produce quality runs to get the Tigers inside of the South Carolina five . The Gamecock defense backed by the noisy crowd shut down the Tigers on three straight plays setting up fourth and goal. With the game on the line Hansbrough came up big pounding through the defensive line to record his third touchdown of the game. Baggett sealed the deal in fine fashion giving the Tigers the 21-20 lead with the PAT.
It was a close game down to the wire as predicted with Missouri edging out the Gamecocks late. Both defenses are to credit as they showed up throughout the contest shutting down any sort of offensive attack. The Tigers were hampered by the absence of White and Hunt, but Sasser was able to step up with his six receptions for 86 yards. South Carolina had a strong run attack with Davis’ 106 yards rushing marking the fourth time this year the Tigers have given up over 100 yards to a single player on the ground. Look for that to potentially double in two weeks when Todd Gurley and the Georgia Bulldogs come to Columbia to take on the Tigers on Oct. 11.
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