#9 Missouri Tigers host Buffalo Bulls

The ninth ranked Missouri Tigers welcome The University of Buffalo Bulls to Faurot field Saturday night.

Buffalo comes in at 1-0 after beating Lafayette 30-13. The Bulls from the Mid-American Conference (MAC) with an interesting combo on offense and defense. Mizzou shouldn’t sleep on Buffalo as that’s exactly what the Bulls would like. New Bulls head coach Pete Lembo is looking to develop energy and attitude for his team and a win against a ranked SEC team on the road would be a massive feather in Buffalo’s cap. Before coming to Buffalo, Lembo was the special teams coordinator at SEC school South Carolina. Previoulsly he was head coach at Ball State from 2011-2015.

Get our free mobile app

Buffalo has a familiar name under center in quarterback C.J. Ogbonna. Ogbonna played at SEMO in Cape Giarardeau, Mo. in 2021 and ’22 and won a juco national championship at Hutchinson CC in Kansas in 2020. He’s a dual threat quarterback that is capable of tucking the ball and running if the pass lanes aren’t open, and they shouldn’t be.

When Ogbonna hands the ball off Buffalo has a couple of go-to backs in Jacquez Barksdale and Al-Jay Henderson, with Barksdale being the more dynamic of the two.

The Bulls also sport an athletic and fiery linebacker in Shaun Dolac who is coming off of a MAC defensive player of the week performance. He’ll want to set the tone for Buffalo by holding down the middle of the defense and forcing Mizzou to spread the field.

Mizzou will want to dominate the line of scrimmage and look for a solid performance by Nate Noel. Quaterback Brady Cook will want to lead a balanced Tiger attack with Luther Burden III and Theo Wease. If Mizzou can establish their speed outside and force Dolac to lean in a particular direction they’ll want to exploit the space in the middle with Daniel Blood and would love to get more touches to tight end  Brett Norfleet.

Defensively the Tigers will want to use their speed in the defensive backfield to force Ogbonna to hold the ball and/or take off running himself where a big Mizzou line will be waiting.

Top ten teams handle business in match-ups like this and Mizzou should.

Tune in for the action Saturday afternoon with 4p pregame and kickoff at 6p on AM 1070 KHMO.