It’s hard to find enough superlatives to describe all that Missouri football running back Tyler Badie has accomplished in his senior season.
Through eight games he has accrued 989 yards and 11 touchdowns on the ground, and 305 yards and 4 touchdowns through the air. Not only that, but Badie has continued to step up when the Tigers need him most.
On Saturday night, Badie’s 73-yard run late in the fourth quarter –– in which he bounced to the outside and outran nearly every Vanderbilt defender –– set freshman quarterback Tyler Macon up for a 2-yard, game-sealing touchdown. When Missouri led by just 3 late in the third quarter, Badie bounced off multiple defenders like a pinball for a 45-yard gain, which set Missouri up for a field goal in the fourth quarter.
Badie finished with 294 all-purpose yards and 2 touchdowns Saturday night, helping Missouri to a 37-28 win at Vanderbilt Stadium in Nashville, Tennessee — its first SEC victory of 2021.
“I want to show everyone that I can run the ball in this league,” Badie said. “Regardless of who we play, if I need to touch the ball 30 times for this team, that’s what I’ll do.”
What the Tigers thought would be a “get-right” game against the two-win Commodores following their bye week quickly became more challenging than anticipated. They struggled to create any separation on the score sheet through 30 minutes and committed several drive-killing penalties.
Missouri raced out to an early lead against Vanderbilt, opening the scoring with a 46-yard field goal from sophomore kicker Harrison Mevis on its first drive. It went up 10-0 halfway through the quarter courtesy of a 13-yard touchdown run from Badie.
But momentum rapidly shifted in favor of the Commodores midway through the first quarter when sophomore quarterback Mike Wright found senior wide receiver Cam Johnson for a 7-yard touchdown.
Not even a minute earlier, walk-on junior running back Stephen Benson blocked a Vanderbilt punt, and the Tigers’ offense took over in the red zone, attempting to add to its lead. Then, redshirt sophomore quarterback Connor Bazelak threw the ball into the waiting hands of senior safety Maxwell Worship. Wright took a designed run 69 yards, and the Commodores found paydirt to cut their deficit to just three.
Vanderbilt only grew in confidence from there. After managing just 6 total yards of offense through their first two drives, the Commodores strung together 171 yards on their next two, scoring touchdowns on each of them.
“We really wanted to start fast in the first quarter, and we did outscore [Vanderbilt] in the first quarter, but we wanted to cut down on penalties, and I don’t think we did that,” Missouri head coach Eli Drinkwitz said.
The Tigers began the afternoon as 16-point Vegas favorites, but Missouri fans don’t have to look back far to find the last time hubris proved costly in Nashville.
In 2019, Missouri traveled to the Music City ranked No. 22 in the country and on a four-game winning streak. That night, the Tigers failed to score more than two touchdowns and lost 21-14.
Down 14-10 right before halftime on Saturday, Missouri seemed destined for a similar result until the final play of the half. With five seconds remaining, Bazelak dropped back and threw a 45-yard Hail Mary pass, which landed in the hands of graduate wide receiver Keke Chism in the far corner of the end zone. They didn’t trail again after that.
“We needed a play to be made,” Chism said. “We got in range where [Drinkwitz] felt good about the call. We went with it, and I knew it was time for this offense to step up and make a play.”
Despite the win, Missouri still has plenty to iron out in the latter half of its season, especially on defense. Vanderbilt averaged 100 rushing yards and 13.25 points per game before Saturday afternoon, but rushed for 258 yards and scored 28 points against the Tigers.
The Tigers struggled to corral Wright, who finished as his team’s leading rusher with 152 yards on the ground and individual runs of 69 and 70 yards.
Vanderbilt freshman running back Patrick Smith finished with 115 all-purpose yards and a touchdown, while Johnson found the end zone on 2 of his 3 total receptions. Still, Missouri felt it saw some positives defensively after its bye week.
“We’re still building throughout the season, but I felt this was a huge step playing together as one defense and one team,” sophomore cornerback Jaylon “JC” Carlies said.
Bazelak’s health will be a question mark for Missouri’s trip to Georgia next week. The quarterback went down with 6:47 remaining in the fourth quarter with what Drinkwitz believes is a soft tissue injury. Macon replaced Bazelak to finish out the game.
Mevis gave Missouri some breathing room late with a 52-yard field goal, his third make of the afternoon, to put Missouri up 9 with just under six minutes remaining.
While the win counts the same in the standings, Saturday’s game felt more reminiscent of the Tigers’ previous loss in Nashville than their 41-0 win at Faurot Field just last season. Still, Missouri did enough to stave off Vanderbilt and pick up the second road win of Drinkwitz’s tenure.
“We know that we have some opponents coming up that are really good,” junior safety Martez Manuel said. “We’re trying to make sure this isn’t our last SEC win.”
The Tigers play at Sanford Stadium Nov. 6, scheduled to kick off at 10 a.m CDT.
Edited by Jacob Richey | ederner@themaneater.com
