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Transcript

Eli Hoff:ÌýGood morning, all. It's a fine day for a Mizzou chat, so let's have one, eh? You'll notice my responses will be a bit intermittent today — Dennis Gates is meeting with the media in about 40 minutes, so I'll have to trot over to that and come back. To make up for it, we'll leave the chat open for a longer window today. You can drop your questions in as you please and check back for answers and the rest of the transcript.

senior scramble:ÌýWhat is going on with Mizzou women's basketball the last 2 games they look better than anytime the last 2 years. They are running a trapping defense and playing with tempo. They always will turn the ball over that is just Mizzou women's basketball, but it has been fun to watch. I realize winning 6 SEC will be a huge challenge with how good the SEC is. Our Bigs aren't SEC type players, but they do compete. Football it is amazing how the expectations have changed. Used to be in the SEC if Mizzou won 7 or 8 games that was a great year, now 9 or 10 is expected. Drink has really raised the bar at Mizzou, in the SEC. that is very tough task. men's basketball I sure hope Warrick gets a lot of minutes going forward. You never know a player can get a lot of minutes one game and zero the next. I hope Gates settles on 9 players by the Kansas game. Playing within 15 points will be a huge challenge but at least having a consistent rotation should help. pacific won't be easy. Thanks for the chat

Hoff:ÌýWhat an up-and-down (or, I guess, down-and-up) start to the women's basketball campaign. A couple of really bad losses, and then a 112-59 win over SLU last night. You're right that it'll be much tougher once conference play rolls around, but it's good to see that the year won't be completely fruitless. We'd talked in one of the recent chats about this season being lost. That still is probably true, given the coaching situation, but if players stay bought in that means something for the program moving forward and its ability to rebound.

Drinkwitz has raised the expectations some, for sure, and he and his players fed into the expectation that they could make the playoff this season. That wasn't just external noise — it was everyone's belief that there was an opportunity there. But I also think the playoff has changed people's expectations for their favorite team, too. Suddenly it's not about thinking you have to go undefeated to make it in, it's a matter of getting a couple big wins and keeping losses to a minimum. It's a confluence of those two developments feeding into morale at the present.

I'm sure we'll talk more about the men's hoops rotation as this goes, but I'm with you. What the rotation and lineups look like against Cal and Kansas in early December will be very telling as to how Gates wants to approach games that this team has to come out and win without enjoying a talent advantage.Ìý

jwvl:ÌýEli, call crazy but I think TX is over rated. What do you think

Hoff:ÌýWell, I won't call you crazy, for starters. The only Texas game I've watched this year was UT-Georgia, and that obviously didn't paint the prettiest portrait of the Longhorns. I haven't watched enough of these CFP contenders to weigh in with any real conviction as to who the 12 should be. All I can tell you is that Mizzou is not and should not be one of them.Ìý

I wonder how different the perception of Texas would be if Michigan was just a little bit better. That was about as strong of a nonconference game as a team had coming on — on the road against the champs in that stadium, even if we suspected the Wolverines wouldn't be the same. And now, it doesn't even look like a particularly great win.Ìý

This wasn't your question, but since we talk about it a lot in these chats: I wonder what that says about how SEC teams wanting to make the playoff should schedule their power conference noncon foes... Or maybe that's generalizing one team and one season too much. I'll add this, though: I'm very intrigued for Texas-Texas A&M. I doubt I'll be able to watch it because of Mizzou-Arkansas, but if I didn't have a game to cover I'd be on the couch and locked in.

Bretto:ÌýI have 3 observationsI hope the Missouri defensive line found the South Carolina QB and introduced themselves to him, because they never got close enough to him during the game to even say hello.

Hoff:ÌýYeah, not a banner day for the pass rush. The third down late in the game where Johnny Walker Jr. just about had Sellers wrapped up for the sack and instead he broke free to complete a pass to move the chains was a game-breaking play at that stage. I asked Drinkwitz about the pass coverage lapses this week and he gave me a really interesting answer about some of the specific calls they were using and what went wrong, but he also mentioned the pass rush not getting to Sellers as a factor. Every second that man coverage (or any coverage, really) needs to hold up adds to the chance that it gives way — so giving a QB time can strain a secondary.Ìý

Bretto:ÌýHere at the second and third. Someone should tell the Missouri defensive backs that when doing pass defense that they should try to be NEXT TO the receiver and not 3 yards away Lastly. Tell the defensive secondary that the rules allow them to PUT THEIR ARMS AROUND THE BALL CARRIERS AND TAKE HIM TO THE GROUND. ON the winning drive for SC, three defensive backs had a clear chance to tackle the ball carrier and each one hit with a shoulder instead of tackling the guy. This could be a coaching issue

Hoff:ÌýSome of the DB spacing is probably a zone coverage thing, to be fair. There were definitely instances where man coverage was a step or two behind where it needed to be, but zones tend to be a little bit softer by nature. But again, there were bigger miscommunications and blown adjustments to what South Carolina that collapsed and led to the Gamecocks consistently getting explosive plays.

The tackling was abysmal. I'd counted four missed tackles on Rocket Sanders' game-winning TD, and there were other guys who could've made plays but didn't. When that happens, teams lose. It's a little strange because poor tackling hadn't been an issue too often this season. It just popped up all at once in that game.

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