Missouri Football: 5 Things That We Learned About the Tigers in 17-5 Win

Jamie Squire/Getty Images

The Missouri Tigers came up with a big win against the Texas Longhorns in a pivotal conference matchup for both schools on Saturday.

MU got it down by holding the Longhorns to just five points in the game, while getting a solid performance from backup RB Kendial Lawrence on the ground.

Here are five things that we learned from Mizzou's win over Texas.

Missouri Will Be Just Fine Without Star RB Henry Josey

Brett Deering/Getty Images

Usually, when an offense with a solid rushing attack loses their star RB, there is a sense of panic among the other players to fill the void going forward.

This will not be the case for the Tigers without Henry Josey, who was lost for the season on Saturday after suffering a knee injury.

Junior tailback Kendial Lawrence, who would probably start on other D-1 football teams, filled in nicely by rushing for 106 yards on 18 carries and scored a touchdown as well.

I expect Lawrence to step in as the featured back for the remainder of the season and Mizzou will not see too much of a slip in production at that position.

James Franklin Is Continuing to Mature into a Big 12 QB

Jamie Squire/Getty Images

James Franklin is clearly still learning the ropes of D-1 college football.

Going into his team's game against Texas, the Missouri sophomore had been fairly inconsistent so far this season.

Saturday's game was definitely a step in the right direction for Franklin and his offense, as he went 18 for 26 with 186 yards and a rushing touchdown.

Although we will likely not see major improvement from him during the remainder of this season, he is getting valuable experience as the starting signal-caller this year and will only improve as he continues to grow into his role with this team.

Missouri Is Still Tough to Beat at Home

Jamie Squire/Getty Images

The Tigers are hard to beat at home, period.

They are 4-1 at home in 2011, and their one loss came to a team that is still undefeated this season.

Sure, they don't win every single game at Faurot Field, but they are still very difficult to beat on their home turf.

This is something that will have to continue going forward if Mizzou is ever going to become one of the elite football programs in the nation.

Missouri's Defense Has the Ability to Take over Games

Jamie Squire/Getty Images

Mizzou's defense completely shutdown Texas on Saturday.

They held the Longhorns to just five points while yielding only 247 total yards of offense for the afternoon.

This is something that we have rarely seen from the Missouri defense this season.

Hopefully this game might be a sign of things to come for this unit in the future.

Missouri Still Has a Great Chance at Landing a Bowl Game

Sarah Glenn/Getty Images

They say that it usually takes at least six wins to get into any postseason bowl game.

This might have seemed like it was impossible a few weeks ago for coach Gary Pinkel and his Tigers, but now it is a real possibility.

With a 5-5 record and their final two games being against a struggling Texas Tech team and a 2-8 Kansas squad, Mizzou could easily finish 7-5 and punch their ticket to yet another bowl game in the Pinkel era.

Although it could just be the Independence Bowl, that's still much better than Missouri could have hoped for after their rough start to the campaign.