COLUMBIA, Mo. – Mizzou Football junior captains LB Nick Bolton (Frisco, Texas) and OL Case Cook (Carrollton, Ga.) earned SEC weekly awards following the team’s 20-10 win over Kentucky last Saturday, announced Monday by the league office. Bolton is the SEC Defensive Player of the Week for the second time in his career, while Cook is the SEC Offensive Lineman of the Week for the first time in his career.
Bolton led one of Mizzou’s most impressive defensive performances in recent memory, posting seven tackles (all solo), 1.0 sack and a QB hurry as the Tigers limited Kentucky to just 145 total yards, its best ever in an SEC game, in a 20-10 win that snapped a five-game losing skid against the Wildcats. Mizzou’s defense was sensational Saturday at Faurot Field, holding Kentucky’s offense to 145 total yards (47 passing yards, 98 rushing yards), with the microscopic 47 passing yards allowed being the fewest ever by an SEC opponent since Mizzou joined its new conference in 2012. The Tigers limited Kentucky’s offense to only 36 plays from scrimmage overall, which stands as the fewest plays ran by an opposing team in 22 years, as Bowling Green tallied 35 total plays on Sept. 5, 1998. The 145 total yards allowed by Mizzou’s defense was its best in a conference game since Nov. 26, 2011, when it limited Kansas to 137. Kentucky picked up just eight first downs on the day, two of which came via penalty.
Bolton, who played every defensive snap Saturday, was the leader of the defense posting seven solo tackles among just 36 defensive plays (19 percent of plays). Mizzou had 26 tackles in the game and Bolton had seven of them (27 percent), and he added a key third-down sack, Mizzou’s only sack of the day. He also posted a QB hurry as he was all over the field in arguably Mizzou’s best defensive performance since joining the SEC.
Cook was a leader on Mizzou’s offensive line that absolutely dominated the line of scrimmage against a great Kentucky defensive line. Playing 94 snaps Saturday, including 92 offensive plays, Cook helped Mizzou hold the ball for a whopping 43:10, the Tigers’ highest single-game TOP since joining the SEC, while running 92 plays with 62 coming on the ground. The 62 rushes were the second-most ever by Mizzou in an SEC game and most since rushing 67 times at Tennessee on Nov. 19, 2016. The 220 rush yards allowed by Kentucky was the most against the Wildcats since Oct. 19, 2019, when Georgia put up 235 on the ground in a 21-0 win. The 62 rushes were the most against Kentucky since Sept. 3, 2016, when Southern Miss had 68.
Mizzou was an unbelievable 14-for-25 combined (56 percent) on third and fourth down, using its offensive line to get tough yards drive in and drive out. As a unit, the offensive line allowed just seven negative plays on 92 offensive plays, controlling the game and beating Kentucky at its own game. Mizzou’s 92 plays limited Kentucky to just 36 offensive snaps, the fewest against a Mizzou team in a league game since 1966 (Kansas State ran 36 in a 27-0 Mizzou win). Cook played 94 snaps on Saturday as the team’s ironman at right guard.
