The Morning Commute for Wednesday, February 5th
Welcome to the Morning Commute
Today we’re talking about former Tiger legend Brock Olivo.
This past weekend, Brock got inducted into the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame. Quite honestly, it’s something that I just assumed had happened a long time ago, and as a member of the hall of fame (I know, not so humble a brag there, sorry) I say welcome to the club and well-deserved!
Here’s Mizzou’s story about the honor for Olivo.
This is what the HOF had for Brock’s bio:
Raised in Hermann just outside of St. Louis, Olivo starred at St. Francis Borgia Regional High School for coach Dale Gildehaus (MSHOF 2018) in the early 1990s. He helped Borgia win a state championship in 1993 and was the Gatorade Missouri Player of the Year that season, finishing his prep career with 5,030 yards rushing and 70 touchdowns. At Mizzou, Olivo led the Tigers to the 1997 Holiday Bowl – MU’s first bowl appearance since 1983. When he left after that season, he was the school’s all-time leading rusher, with 3,026 yards, and his 188 points ranked him fourth on the career scoring list. The 1994 Big Eight Conference Offensive Freshman of the Year, Olivo won the Mosi Tatupu National Special Teams Player of the Year Award in 1997 – making him the first Tiger to ever win a national individual award. He later played 44 games as a special teams standout for the NFL’s Detroit Lions, and served on NFL staffs from 2014 to 2019, including with coach Andy Reid and the Kansas City Chiefs from 2014 to 2016. He coached in Italy from 2007 to 2011 and is now on the Mizzou staff as an assistant special teams coach.
The Mizzou presence with the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame is massive, to say the least. I tried to do a search on the HOF website to get a count of how many former Tiger athletes, coaches, administrators and staff members are inductees, but it was too cumbersome of a task.
If you want to learn more about the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame (which is located in Springfield, Mo.), you can visit their home page here.
Yesterday at Rock M and Rock M+
- Mizzou football has a lot to replace in both production and leadership in 2025. Dan Keegan took a look at the challenges ahead as the Tigers look to build on the momentum…
Any Mizzou fan can see the talent lost in these last two cycles, simply by perusing NFL rosters. But this core was also a special group of player leaders, something that is a lot harder to find than a 4.5 40-yard dash wide receiver or a 1,000-yard running back.
We’re all optimistic that the Tigers won’t take a step back in 2025, and while it’s good that the fan base in general has growing expectations, maybe it’s prudent to take a step back and appreciate just what these last two years have been. Awww screw it – 15-0 or bust in 2025, right?…
- Tons of goings on with Olympic sports at Mizzou, and Rock M’s Karen Steger had the weekly recap to keep you updated here…
The Tigers (gymnastics) put together their second complete four-rotation performance of the season in Baton Rouge, earning another much-needed 197 score, and only counted one single score under 9.80 While Missouri didn’t get any season high rotation scores, they did have rotations that were just off their best, and took shares of first place in multiple events, including bars (Mara, 9.95), vault (Hannah, 9.925), and beam (Helen).
The gymnastics team is off to big-time start in their 2024-25 season. With Helen Hu flirting with perfect 10.0 performances every night, this team has a lot potential to make some noise in the post-season…
- Tuesday’s Morning Commute from Sammy Stava included updates on the men’s hoops team’s upward mobility in the rankings, a WNBA trade of a Tiger legend, all sorts of analysis of the hoops win at Mississippi State, and a look at some football coaching trivia…
There’s no doubt that Mizzou is playing like one of the best teams in the country right now. However, a road contest at No. 4 Tennessee on Wednesday night and a home date vs No. 10 Texas A&M on Saturday afternoon loom for the Tigers. It’s a challenging week ahead, but there are opportunities for this team to make even more of a statement…
I doubt hardly anyone outside of the Mizzou locker room had a #15 ranking and three top-10 wins on their bingo card coming into the year, but that’s exactly what Dennis Gates and company have achieved so far. Who knows how high the ceiling is for this team, but they sure seem like they can make some noise the rest of the season!…
- Over at Rock M+: Matt Harris dropped another recruiting update, this time on the son of a True Son, Jimmy McKinney III ($):
It’s not solely the fact he’s doubled his scoring output, but McKinney III is making the kind of progress his father wants to see from him as a distributor. McKinney III also shoots the ball well enough off from 3-point range that – as you’ll see – he can already start creating the gravity required to introduce wrinkles by screening for a lead guard like Williams.
Plus an early look ahead to the Tennessee matchup, the Lineup performances from the MSU game, and a minutes projection update from DataMizzou.
Rock M Radio: All Is Wonderful with Mizzou Olympic Sports World
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