Missouri Football: Harrison Mevis may be on the hot seat

Will we soon see kicker controversy in Missouri?

On Thursday, the Missouri Tigers opened their football season at home against the South Dakota Coyotes. The Tigers won the game 35-10. Overall, Mizzou played a good game. The problem is, it should have ended 41-10. Why? Kicker Harrison Mevis missed two field goals.

Let’s turn back the clock and take a look at who Harrison Mevis used to be. Mevis was a three-star kicker coming out of Warsaw Community High School in Indiana. In his freshman year in 2020, he was 17-20 on field goals and made all 28 PATs. He was 9 of 12 from 30+ yards on field goals. In his sophomore year, he was 23-25 on field goals with his only two misses being from 40-49 yards. He was a perfect 5-5 from 50+. He was also perfect on PATs.

Moving on to last year, he took a slight step back. Especially in clutch time. While he was still perfect on PATs, he was only 22-28 on field goals. Two of the misses were chip shots, from 20-29 yards. One of them would have been a game-winner against Auburn. Which Mizzou went on to lose in overtime. The other misses came in games that Mizzou won.

That’s the one silver lining. Some of the misses came in the Abilene Christian game last season, which is a similar opponent to South Dakota.

But why am I saying any of this? Because in Thursday’s game, Harrison Mevis missed both of the field goal opportunities he had. Starting off the season 0-2 is not ideal in the slightest. But not only that, he nearly missed another kick before it was redone due to an offsides penalty called on South Dakota. This is an issue.

Forget the quarterback controversy between Brady Cook and Sam Horn. Head coach Eli Drinkwitz knew it was Cook all along. No, the controversy should be with the kickers. And Mevis’ seat is on fire. If he fails to perform against Middle Tennessee next Saturday night, there should be many questions.