How Missouri football is looking to avoid costly offensive penalties moving forward

Missouri football might just have an effort problem.

No, not the indifferent, uncaring kind.

The Tigers, when it comes to the multiple holding penalties that cost them yards during Saturday’s win over Buffalo on Faurot Field, might be trying too hard to finish off some blocks.

“You know, we’ve got to learn to let go. When the ball is out, (when there’s) leverage, when a defender is broken away, we cannot continue to engage with the jersey of the defender,” Missouri coach Eli Drinkwitz said. “And, so, there were three of those that were clear calls — easy, easy calls that are something that we have to correct. 

“And you appreciate guys playing with effort and energy, but they’ve got to know when it’s crossing the line into a penalty.”

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The Mizzou offense still is off to an efficient start. The 2-0 Tigers have averaged more than 200 rushing yards per game, and they took what was offered to them in the passing game to comfortably knock off the Bulls.

But the penalties are a lingering issue. Especially with 24th-ranked Boston College on deck.

The Tigers had five flags thrown against them for holding vs. the Bulls, although only four of those stood on the final stat sheet. One holding call against wide receiver Mookie Cooper was declined by Buffalo because the Bulls picked Brady Cook off during the same play.

“I mean, up front our mentality is we’re trying to finish people all the time,” Missouri left guard Cayden Green said. “So, sometimes we go a little bit overboard. We’ve just got to work on not going so overboard.”

Two of the fouls went against offensive linemen, with Green picking up one and right tackle Armand Membou inviting the other. The others were called against tight ends Tyler Stephens and Jordon Harris.

Missouri now has 17 offensive penalties on the season, and exactly zero of those have gone against the Tigers’ defense. Only one came on special teams, when the Tigers took a delay of game on a punt against Murray State.

In addition to the four holding calls against Buffalo, the Tigers had three holding penalties against Murray State. That’s going to take a little more cleaning up than, quite literally, letting go.

“You know, we’ve just got to work on getting our hands inside,” Green said. “We talk to refs before the game and during the week so we can see what kind of officiating we’re dealing with, and so we just work off of that throughout the week, work on getting our hands inside and finishing blocks, but not finishing, you know, in a bad position.”

Those four holding calls were part of a much larger issue from the offense Saturday. The Tigers incurred 10 offensive penalties om all, which cost them 80 yards.

Three of those were formation penalties: two on ineligible receiver calls; one on illegal formation. Those drew the ire of the head coach more than perhaps any other offensive misstep.

“Well, quite honestly, the alignment penalties are just embarrassing,” Drinkwitz said. “As the head football coach, that’s on me. That’s undisciplined football, and for me to allow that to happen — we had an alignment penalty in the first game, and to have it again in the second game? That’s on me. So, that’s got to get corrected (and) get taken off the tape.”

That prompted the Tigers, per the head coach, to carve out a period of their Monday practice and dedicate the time to alignment and alignment alone.

The remaining three penalties called on MU’s offense Saturday were a facemask violation on backup right guard Mitchell Walters and a pair of false starts.

“The other ones — we’ll be alright,” Drinkwitz said. “We’ll figure that out.”