Daniel-led Tigers ready for Racers

[Note: this story has been modified since its original posting.]

For the Missouri football team, it’s finally time to put that preseason practice into motion.

For new starting quarterback Chase Daniel, it’s time to turn hype into results.

Two hundred forty-four days. That’s how long it has been since the Tigers walked out of Independence Stadium in Shreveport, La. , as Independence Bowl champions.

Gone is Brad Smith, the most prolific quarterback in Tigers history, who accounted for 432 yards and four touchdowns in that Dec. 30 game. But out of his shadow comes Daniel, a 19-year-old quarterback who appears ready to establish his own reputation, not as the one replacing a living legend in Columbia, but as a dynamic passer on a mission to eliminate the stereotype that Missouri can never be a football school.

“Man, we’ve been going against our defense forever,” Daniel said, alluding to the offense’s preseason preparation. “It’s so exciting to see a defense other than our own.”

Act 1 for Daniel comes Saturday as the Tigers open their 2006 campaign hosting the Murray State Racers at 6 p.m.

The Tigers have insisted that they aren’t going to put a mark in the win column prematurely, even knowing that the Racers posted an unimpressive 2-9 record last season, including 28 turnovers, the most in Division 1AA.

It was only five years ago, in Pinkel’s debut as Missouri’s head coach, that an overconfident Tiger team watched its season start in ominous fashion against Bowling Green. Although the Mid-American Conference team hadn’t had a winning record since 1994, it marched out of Columbia with a stunning upset over the Tigers in Missouri’s 2001 season opener.

While no one from that 2001 team will don a Missouri uniform against Murray State, this Tigers’ team is heeding hindsight.

“You really have to expect the unexpected,” Pinkel said of Saturday’s matchup. “We really haven’t talked about this being a 1AA game or anything. We are talking about this as our first game and our most important game right now that we have.”

The changes on the Missouri team go far deeper than new names on the field. There has been a noticeable shift in attitude, a sense that this group of players truly understands, and appreciates, what it means to be a team.

For now, animosity between players and coaches remains merely a mark of the past. In 2004, friction between coaches and running back Damien Nash resulted in Nash prematurely leaving the team. And over the past few seasons, players have seemed hesitant to buy into Pinkel’s leadership and game plan.

This past offseason proved to be a remedy for all that.

“(Tension) was here in ‘03 when I got here, but now it seems to be gone,” senior co-captain Brad Ekwerekwu said. “It’s a mentality. We’re feeling great, and we have a lot more confidence.”

Ekwerekwu said both sides were to be blamed for that tension. Now, however, there is a trust shared among coaches and players. Unlike in the past, this year’s team captains urged 100 percent attendance at voluntary summer practices.

Even Pinkel, who has often been labeled as distant and bland in seasons past, seems to have turned over a new leaf.

Players noticed a change in demeanor when he canceled the second half of a two-a-day practice one day this summer to bring the team out to the movies. On Monday, reporters even got a taste of Pinkel’s personality when he treated them to cake in celebration of two writers’ birthdays.

Pinkel downplayed the changes in his demeanor but did allude to the positive dynamic he sees in this squad.

“I don’t know if I’m more confident with this team. I like this team,” said Pinkel, who begins the season with a 29-30 record at Missouri. “I like being around this team. I like the seniors, the captains. Other than that, I’m the same, old boring guy.”

That self-proclaimed boring guy has had the task of preparing the Tigers for a game that is still somewhat shrouded in the unknown. Murray State arrives with a new system under a new head coach and supporting staff. Its starting quarterback, sophomore Ryne Salyer, enters the season after having sandwiched flashes of brilliance last season between the 13 interceptions he threw.

This will be a game certain to evoke curiosity among those Tiger faithful who still aren’t quite sure what to expect from a Missouri team that has undergone a face-lift since last season. And it is a game that will likely set the tone for the 11 regular season games to follow.

That is, unless you are coming from Murray State, in which Saturday’s game is essentially driven by one thing: money.

“It was done before I got here,” Murray State’s first-year head coach Matt Griffin said when asked why the Racers scheduled this nonconference game. “If I had the choice, I wouldn’t want to be playing them. But it’s money.”

According to Murray State’s sports information director Kevin Britton, the payment Murray State will receive from making the trip to Columbia will total $250,000, which will cover a significant portion of the team’s expected yearly expenses of $1.9 million.

But while the Racers are simply awaiting a check, the Tigers need to get out of the gate quickly as they look toward producing only their fifth winning season since 1983.

And on Saturday, the Tigers’ greatest concern won’t lie in the arm of Salyer, or any other Murray State player for that matter.

“The thing we talk about with our players is this is about preparation and us trying to play our best game,” Pinkel said. “It’s time to go out and find out where you’re at. I would be disappointed if we don’t play with enthusiasm and passion.”

Ekwerekwu and the other three senior captains insist that mediocrity won’t cut it this year.

Now it’s time to find out.

“It might have been (different) in the past,” Ekwerekwu said, “but we focus on doing things right now.”