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COLUMBIA, Mo. — If Missouri football coaches get their way, special teams will be in style this season.

After a rather poor season of special teams play in 2024 but an influx of depth in the program after a productive offseason, the Tigers will test a relatively simple hypothesis: If they get more of their starting-caliber players involved and bought in to playing special teams, those units ought to perform better in 2025.

That’s the theory, anyway.

“If we want to be good on special teams, we have to have our best players play,� special teams coordinator Erik Link told the Post-Dispatch. “That could be one phase, that could be two phases.�

To be clear, this isn’t about the specialists — the kicker or the punter — but the players around them: those who have other roles on offense or defense but are necessary as blockers and chase-down tacklers on kickoffs and punts.

On the whole, those units didn’t perform too well in 2024. Mizzou’s special teams, across the board, were a net negative according to ESPN’s SP+ ranking, which is an opponent-adjusted measure of efficiency. MU ranked 98th among the 134 Football Bowl Division programs in special teams SP+ at the end of last season.

That was the third-worst in the Southeastern Conference, with only Texas and Auburn ranked lower. Those three were the only league members with negative special teams SP+ scores. Mississippi, Florida and Vanderbilt, meanwhile, were the top three in the nation.

The Rebels, Gators and Commodores all missed the College Football Playoff, so it’s not like SP+ scores make or break a team’s quality. It’s probably not even a metric that anyone on the Mizzou coaching staff cares about.

Still, it shows the room for growth in special teams performance.

Enter the depth the Tigers acquired this offseason.

Positions like linebacker, defensive end, safety and wide receiver are full of players talented enough to see the field regularly. Given the fact that only two or three players from each of those positions can be on the field at any time, some aren’t going to play as much as they’d like or deserve — even with in-game rotation.

That’s where the coaches’ special teams pitch comes in.

“(If) we get 60 reps in a game and we’re dividing it 30-30, go get another 15 on special teams,� coach Eli Drinkwitz said, “and make an impact in a way that will have a dramatic effect on us.�

“A guy might be a starter on defense,� Link said, “but he might be sharing time. It might up another 10, 15 plays, 12 plays, whatever it is to help out on the kicking game.�

Seems straightforward enough. Only games — now less than a month away, with calendars turned to August — will tell whether that pitch works.

Last year, the four non-specialists to play the most special teams snaps — counting kickoff coverage and returns, punt coverage and returns and both sides of the ball on field-goal attempts — were mostly reserves. Tight end Tyler Stephens played 172 special teams snaps compared to 150 offensive snaps, safety Trajen Greco got 164 on special teams compared to 37 on defense, cornerback Ja’Marion Wayne played 136 on special teams compared to 29 on defense and linebacker Brady Hultman played 135 on special teams to just two on defense.

The only regular starter to play more than 100 special teams snaps last season was middle linebacker Corey Flagg, who was 13th among non-specialists in special teams snaps.

The point? Mizzou’s best players weren’t appearing on special teams duty.

“The more high-quality depth you have on a football team should improve your team in all three phases, but certainly in the kicking game,� Link said.

“It’s got to help our special teams,� Drinkwitz said. “We were not where we wanted to be last year in special teams, and that’s an area we have to improve. That means getting better players on the field. That means getting our most consistent players on the field.�

Camp notes

Drinkwitz met with reporters following Mizzou’s Saturday practice, which was its fifth of fall camp.

To no surprise, he has not named a starting quarterback. The competition at left tackle remains ongoing, too, with Jayven Richardson and Johnny Williams IV in the mix.

Quarterback contenders Sam Horn and Beau Pribula have “all done some really good things and some really dumb things,� Drinkwitz said. “And that’s kind of the quarterback position. Now it’s about seeing, do they continually make that same mistake or can they self-correct?�

Trajen Greco, who is expected to be in the safety rotation this season, has not practiced this week with what Drinkwitz dubbed a “soft-tissue injury.� He’s expected to return to practice Sunday. Safety Jalen Catalon missed Saturday’s practice and center Connor Tollison was limited, but neither is a long-term or serious issue.

Camp will progress in intensity next week when Missouri has two days of intrasquad scrimmages on tap.