Can Missouri football rise to the challenge in the 2024 season?

The signs of the moment are everywhere you look.

It’s 7 p.m. on Saturday, Aug. 24, outside Columbia’s Memorial Stadium, exactly five days before it all begins. The university’s emblem twirls and pulses on the new video board in the Missouri football team’s north end zone, which in a few years will top $250 million in clubhouses, patios and patrons.

Across Faurot Field, the scoreboard above the $98 million south end zone facility is testing the waters: It’s Missouri 24, Murray State 3, with 14 minutes, 28 seconds left in the second quarter. Mizzou has 47 yards of total offense to the Racers’ 154. Don’t ask how that math is done.

University of Michigan students park their cars in the Memorial Stadium parking lots and wander around. Who among them will be there for the opening game, from the group that sold out their allotted season tickets by August 21? How many of their family and friends are among the season ticket holders who sold out a week earlier?

The sun cracks its way over the central Missouri horizon after a day of thunder and persistent rain, hovering just above the $33 million Stephens Indoor Facility like a halo.

This place has been preparing for a year like this for some time now.

He looks ready.

I definitely feel ready.

The last thing left to ask: Is Mizzou ready yet?

More: Why Missouri Football Will Be King Under New Mizzou Athletic Director Laird Veatch

By all preseason predictions, speculation and chatter, Missouri is a contender to make a run at the inaugural 12-team College Football Playoff.

The Tigers opened the season as the No. 11 team in both the U.S. LMB Coaches Poll and the AP Top 25, and barring a major upset against FCS team Murray State in Thursday night’s season opener at Faurot Field, they’ll move into the top 10 thanks to a Week 0 loss at No. 10 Florida State.

The Tigers went 11-2 last season in a dream — and mostly unexpected — year that catapulted the Columbia team into a new realm of national conversation.

And everything from the facilities to the roster to the schedule to the expanded playoffs seems to be falling into place at exactly the right time.

Each of Mizzou’s games this season falls into one of four categories:

On the Faurot field (Auburn; Oklahoma and five others).
Against a team the Tigers beat easily last year (vs. Vandy, in South Carolina, vs. Arkansas).
Against a team with a new head coach (at Texas A&M, Alabama and Mississippi State).
University of Massachusetts.

So good you’d think they picked it themselves. Even some of the most gruesome games — at Texas A&M against Oklahoma — benefit from the physical relief of a week’s rest before them. That’s probably the best you can get in a modern power conference.

And if not now, then when?

“I feel pretty confident that we have two players deep at almost every position,” Drinkiwtz said Aug. 10. … “For us, it’s about continuing to build that competitive depth on special teams and making sure that 35, 36 (players) are capable and ready to win in the SEC.”

This is likely the final year for Luther Burden III, the electric receiver who has somehow changed the caliber of recruits Missouri can pursue. It’s the final stretch of games for the Tigers’ third-year starter at quarterback, Brady Cook. The offensive line is as promising as Drinkwitz’s team has always claimed, and there’s no shortage of playmakers to reap the rewards.

There are credible questions about the defense. Ten starters and key players remained from last season, with five players selected in the 2024 NFL Draft. Add in a new defensive leader in Corey Batoon, and it’s a serious shakeup.

Can the new cornerbacks get a head start? What about the defensive line, where a first-round pick and a slew of rotation pieces are gone? That’s up to the games to sort out, but a top-10 transfer and top-20 recruiting class, made possible by a sizable lead in the NIL, appears to have filled in some of the major gaps.

“I don’t know if we have any tangible proof that we can be good or not. I think you find out if you’re good by playing. That’s the thing about football, every year it starts all over again. We’re starting to measure ourselves against our opponents now. That’s the reality of football, and that’s why competition and football are the greatest sports in the world, because we don’t talk about it, we talk about it.”

Yes, they will play every game. The Tigers’ record will be their record and the CFP committee will decide if that is good enough for a meaningful game in December.

But on Thursday, in the final moments before kickoff on Faurot Field and the first signs of whether Mizzou “will deliver,” it’s worth asking…

When was the last time—and maybe the next time—you felt this way?

More: Missouri football team releases full roster for 2024 season. See who made the cut here

More: Which transfer will have the biggest impact on Missouri football season? 5 candidates