No, the 2024 Tigers didn’t make the Top 10 list, but they were close!
I’m back to continue my stream of thought from last week about the top 10 most historically significant Mizzou football teams of all time, where I left off after the top five.
Coming up with the first five was actually a little easier than the six through 10 spots, for some reason. There’s a pretty clear line of demarcation in my opinion between the top five and the rest. But that doesn’t mean the following teams weren’t great as well, they just each had a setback or two that kept them from ascending into the upper tier.
If you missed the initial story, here’s the top five I wrote about last week.
Here’s my personal take on the next five teams…
6. 1939 – 8-2, Big Six champs, Orange Bowl vs. #16 Georgia Tech, final AP rank – #6
This was back in the day when the rankings weren’t updated after bowl games, so the ranking is a bit inflated (due to the 21-7 loss to Georgia Tech in the Orange Bowl), but this was still an historic Tiger team. It won Don Faurot his first-ever conference title, thanks in large part to going 3-1 vs. ranked teams. The 20-7 win at #17 NYU was a big reason why “Pitchin” Paul Christman got a national rep that led to him earning consensus All-American honors this season. This team really was the first that put Missouri on the national radar, so to speak…
7. 1968 – 8-3, Gator Bowl champs, final AP rank – #9
This team had the potential to be bigger historically, but it tripped up in the season opener at unranked Kentucky, and then closed with two straight losses to wrap the regular season at unranked Oklahoma and to rival kansas which left them just 7-3 in the regular season. Any frustrations felt by the lost opportunities were taken out on 12th-ranked Alabama in the Gator Bowl, as Mizzou dominated with a 35-10 win that Bear Bryant called one of the biggest butt kickings he’d ever been dealt. This team set the stage for the 1969 team, which ended #4 on my list of all time Tiger teams…
8. 1965 – 8-2-1 – Sugar Bowl champs, final AP rank – #6
Like the 1968 squad would later experience, the ‘65 team suffered a disappointing loss to Kentucky to begin the year (a 7-0 shutout). It would recover to post a 7-2-1 regular season, with the only other blemishes being a 14-14 tie with UCLA and a 16-14 loss at #3 Nebraska. There were no wins against ranked foes in 1965, but the team closed in stellar fashion with a 20-18 win over Florida and Heisman QB Steve Spurrier in the Sugar Bowl. The final AP rank of #6 absolutely puts this team among the best in Mizzou history…
9. 1998 – 8-4, Insight Bowl champs, final AP rank – #21
The 8-4 record might not jump out as mind-blowingly impressive, but don’t discount how good this team was. No, it didn’t have a win over a ranked team, but all four losses were to top-10 teams, and three of those (at #7 Nebraska, at #6 Texas A&M and at home to #2 Kansas State), were all by one score. Which means that Corby Jones, Justin Smith, Devin West and company were important because they gave hope to the Mizzou fan base that it was possible for the Tigers to dig out of the wilderness period we’d all suffered through for 13 years. The 1997 team (7-5) set the table, and this team built on it by being ranked virtually all year and coming so close to having some signature wins. Even though they fell short of the top-10 wins, they closed the year with an exciting win over West Virginia in the Insight.com Bowl, and the eight-win total was the most for Mizzou since 1981. Even though the architect of the team, Coach Larry Smith, would eventually get sick and be unable to continue the momentum, this success gave Mizzou fans – and the school administration – a hunger to be a winning program, and that led to the hiring of Gary Pinkel. If Coach Smith doesn’t have the success of 1997 and 1998, I don’t think GP even considers coming to Mizzou. The rest, as they say, is history…
10. 1978 – 8-4, Liberty Bowl champs, final AP rank – #15
I’d say this team on paper was likely more talented than the 1998 team, considering all the NFL draft picks that came from the roster, but I think it’s justifiable to rank them just below the ‘98 team because the success of this ‘78 team didn’t really lead to anything substantial overall for the program. In just a short six years, Mizzou was officially wandering into the wilderness, and would produce 13 straight losing seasons from 1984 until 1997. The ‘78 team bookended the season with a pair of amazing wins – opening with a 3-0 win at defending national champ and 5th-ranked Notre Dame (coached by Dan Devine), and finishing with a 35-31 win at #2 Nebraska, preventing the Huskers a shot at the national title and forcing them into an Orange Bowl rematch with Oklahoma. It would be Mizzou’s last win over Nebraska until 2003. In between those games, Mizzou went 5-4 with losses to #1 Alabama, #1 Oklahoma, and unranked Colorado and Oklahoma State. A 48-0 whitewashing of ku was certainly noteworthy, as was the 20-15 win over LSU in the Liberty Bowl to close the season out…
Now’s your chance to chime in. Among the teams I put in my all time top-10, which one do you consider to be the best or the most important? Or maybe it’s your favorite, use any assessment you choose.
Of course, Mizzou has enjoyed much more than just 10 noteworthy seasons, so here’s a quick recap of some of the best Tiger teams that just missed my cut for best of all time…
Honorable mention (in chronological order)
- 1941 – 8-2, Big Six champs, Sugar Bowl vs. #6 Fordham (Lost 2-0), final AP #7 but that was when bowl game results weren’t factored into final rankings. The team didn’t play a high profile schedule, as the game against Fordham was its only one against a ranked opponent. After dropping a 12-7 season opener at Ohio State, the Tigers rolled to eight straight wins, with a scoring margin of 219 to 37, including five shutouts in a six-game stretch that ranks as the most impressive defensive display in program history…
- 1976 – 6-5, no final ranking. This was likely one of the craziest seasons in CFB history, the 1976 Mizzou team that finished 6-5 and unranked, but featured three road wins at top-10 ranked opponents (W, 46-25 at #8 USC / W, 22-21 at #2 Ohio State / W, 34-24 at #3 Nebraska). Lost three games to unranked teams (Illinois, Iowa State and kansas)…
- 1997 – 7-5, final AP #23. Team’s biggest win was a 51-50 double OT thriller at #12 Oklahoma State. Early season loss at Kansas was a downer but the four remaining losses were to ranked teams, and they reached a bowl game for the first time since 1983, so this team restored hope to Tiger fans…
- 2003 – 8-5, no final ranking. Gary Pinkel’s first winning team that established his fledgling program as one that could work at Mizzou. This group also had an historic win over 10th-ranked Nebraska, giving Tiger fans their first taste of victory over the Huskers since 1978. Thanks to the talents of Brad Smith, Zach Abron and James Kinney, the Tigers reached a bowl game for the first time since 1998, but dropped a 27-14 decision to Arkansas…
- 2008 – 10-4, Big XII North champs, Alamo Bowl champs, final AP #19. Let’s be honest this was a disappointing follow up to the 2007 season, but it didn’t start that way. The Tigers began the preseason with national title hopes and a ranking of #6 and rose as high as #3 in the polls after a 5-0 start that included a glorious 52-17 slaughter of Nebraska in Lincoln. But the wheels fell off in consecutive losses to #17 Oklahoma State at home and to #4 Texas on the road. The Tigers won the Big XII North division, despite a bitter loss to kansas in Arrowhead Stadium to close the year. They returned to Arrowhead one week later and got ambushed by #4 Oklahoma, but got its 10th win to close the season in a thrilling overtime win against Northwestern in the Alamo Bowl to send out stars Chase Daniel, Jeremy Maclin, Chase Coffman and others out in style…
- 2010 – 10-3, Big XII North co-champs, Insight Bowl vs. Iowa, final AP #18. This is the team that started unranked, but sped to 7-0 to reach as high as #7 in the polls after its monumental Homecoming win over BCS #1-ranked Oklahoma (Gahn McGaffie, anyone?). But two straight road losses at Nebraska and Texas Tech brought them back to earth. Three wins to close the regular season (including vs. kansas at Arrowhead) got them back into the top 15, but a heartbreaking last-minute loss to Iowa in the Insight Bowl left them at 10-3 and 18th overall for the season rankings…
- 2014 – 11-3, SEC East champs, Citrus Bowl champs, final AP #14. This team didn’t quite reach the heights its 2013 predecessor did, but with a new QB and a revamped backfield, it didn’t carry the expectations that the 2008 team did when it returned virtually the entire team from the year before. The 2014 Tigers started 3-0 but suffered a home upset at the hands of unranked Indiana before an improbable come-from-behind win at #13 South Carolina. Next they were outclassed at home by #13 Georgia (34-0) but then found a groove that produced six straight wins to put them at #14 in the polls and claim the SEC East title for a second straight year. A SEC title game loss to Alabama was painful, but the Tigers rebounded with a shellacking of Minnesota (33-17) in the Citrus Bowl to close out an outstanding 11-win season…
- 2024 – 10-3, Music City Bowl champs, final AP #22. Sorry to make you wait until the end, but the premise of this exercise was to see where the 2024 team that we just witnessed ranked among the best teams in program history. As you can see, I have the 2024 outside the top-10, and I can’t imagine anyone throwing a fit about that assessment. This team had high hopes coming in about grabbing a spot in the brand new 12-team College Football Playoff, and a 4-0 start to the season which included close wins over #24 Boston College and a double OT thriller against upstart Vanderbilt added to it. But the team fell flat in a 41-10 loss at #25 Texas A&M, and it seemed like it was playing catch up the rest of the year. Anytime a Tiger team wins 10 games, it’s absolutely an outstanding season, but a 34-0 loss at Alabama (albeit without QB Brady Cook for most of the game) and a gut wrenching last-minute defeat at South Carolina knocked the Tigers out of CFP contention. To their credit, they closed the year strong with wins at Mississippi State and at home against rival Arkansas before knocking off Iowa (27-24) in the Music City Bowl to give the Tigers back-to-back 10-win seasons for the first time since 2013-14…
From a 50,000-foot perspective, as I see the Mizzou program historically, Don Faurot was essentially the founder of the program and got it competing on a national level at times. Dan Devine raised the ante and showed Mizzou could be a national championship contender. After ups and downs and some years in the wilderness, Larry Smith gave a brief glimpse of hope and Gary Pinkel took that up to another level. That success set the stage for the most significant occurrence in program history – being invited to the SEC, which secured the program’s future in the crazy evolution of the sport and led to Eliah Drinkwitz who has successfully guided the Tigers to exciting heights in this new era of the sport.
What’s in store for 2025? Let’s hope this time next year I’m adding them to the list of top-10 best teams in Mizzou history!
Thanks for reading, please share feedback on what teams you feel were omitted or those that I perhaps overrated.