‘We’re the real Columbia.’ Confident Mizzou makes itself at home at Williams-Brice
With three minutes left in South Carolina’s 23-10 loss to Missouri, Tigers defensive back Martez Manuel wrapped up quarterback Spencer Rattler, brought him to the ground, then took a white towel from his back pocket and twirled it in the air — mimicking USC’s “Sandstorm” tradition.
The taunt was the perfect symbol of Missouri’s Saturday-night dominance. The team from Columbia, Missouri visited the SEC’s other Columbia and made itself at home.
Before the game, Manuel gave his Tigers teammates a fiery speech in the locker room — the kind of speech that couldn’t be repeated to the media. Fellow defender Isaiah McGuire addressed his teammates, too, reminding them that the Gamecocks haven’t yet beat this group of Tigers, and that’s a winning streak they needed to extend. Including this year’s loss, USC is 0-4 against Mizzou dating back to 2019.
The Gamecocks are also 0-4 against Missouri head coach Eli Drinkwitz, who defeated USC while he was still coaching Appalachian State in 2019. Even with No. 25 USC (5-3, 2-3 SEC) riding a four-game winning streak and entering the Top 25, the Tigers (4-4, 2-3) stepped into Williams-Brice Stadium with all the confidence they needed to win.
“Top 25 win on the road, sellout crowd — we did a great job ignoring the noise,” Drinkwitz said. “Proud of our leadership. Tez gave an emotional pregame speech, and our guys were ready to play and didn’t flinch. (USC) really only had two drives of significance.”
Those two drives — one at the end of the first half and the other in the beginning of the second half — only resulted in a touchdown and a field goal. USC’s Rattler-led offense was out of sorts the entire night, going three-and-out on four of its first eight drives. Even on the touchdown drive, the Gamecocks received a huge boost from the Mizzou defense, which committed three straight penalties to set up a seven-yard Rattler touchdown scramble.
Otherwise, the Tigers defense bottled up the Gamecocks the entire night, holding them to just 203 total yards. The Mizzou offense, meanwhile, racked up 367 yards, and quarterback Brady Cook dazzled with both his right arm and his legs, using an effective read-option attack to rush for 53 yards and connecting with receiver Dominic Lovett for 10 receptions and 148 yards.
Though the USC defense held Mizzou to just two second-half field goals, the ease at which the Tigers moved the ball in the first half allowed them to set up a comfortable lead.
“We picked up immediately on what they were doing (defensively),” Cook said. “They showed us the looks we thought they were going to. We adjusted quickly and made plays.”
With the victory, Missouri brought home the Mayor’s Cup — a trophy given to the Columbia school that comes out on top. The Tigers weren’t shy about celebrating the win in front of a sellout Gamecocks crowd, with Manuel mimicking the “Sandstorm” towel twirl and other Tigers players interacting with fans in the stands.
Another defensive back, Ennis Rakestraw Jr., said he did a “griddy” dance move on the sidelines and pretended to drink out of the trophy, saying the fans “don’t like me very much.”
“It’s an upset, but we already felt like we were gonna beat them coming in here,” Rakestraw said. “It’s a trophy game. We wanted to take something with us. We took that. We showed we’re the real Columbia.”
This story was originally published October 30, 2022 at 8:50 AM.
