On any given night, a team desperate enough can sneak up against the stiffest competition, and Texas knows that pain already this season. To keep them grounded night in and night out, the Longhorns play with the mantra of “playing a team, not a name.”
“You play a nameless, faceless opponent every game; that way, you’re going to play your game every time,” redshirt junior pitcher Luke Harrison said. “You’re not going to go out there and change when the moment gets big or when there’s a small school coming in and you think it’s going to be different. Every time, it’s the same game.”
No. 7 Texas baseball will face another set of Tigers this weekend following an upset over the LSU Tigers, venturing to Columbia, Missouri, to face the Missouri Tigers.
The Tigers’ season has been rocky. Entering their series with Texas, Missouri is the second-worst team in the conference, holding a losing record of 9–14 and having yet to capture their first Southeastern Conference win of the season.
To get a better perspective of the 2025 Tigers, The Daily Texan sat down with Missouri’s student newspaper, The Maneater’s baseball beat writer, Sam Meyer.
In their six games in the SEC, facing then No. 2 LSU and No. 24 Ole Miss last weekend, the Tigers have kept pace with their opponents at the plate putting runs on the boards in the first couple of frames. As the game marches on, Missouri’s pitching begins to falter allowing opposing teams to take control of the game.
“We’ve had good hitting for sure,” Meyer said. “It’s mainly been our pitching that’s been the issue. Both are relieving and starting. … We’ve had good first four or five innings, and then it starts to fall apart a little bit at the fifth or sixth inning mark.”
Some of the biggest moments of the season for the Longhorns have come during fielding mishaps. Not beating around the bush, Meyer was honest when assessing the Missouri fielding operation.
“I haven’t seen a lot of double plays,” Meyer said. “There’s the occasional error, for sure. It’s nothing to write home about our fielding. I don’t notice a ridiculous amount of errors, but it’s not necessarily the cleanest of operations.”
Playing in a ballpark in all shapes and sizes, the Longhorns are set for a major change of environment and scenery. Taylor Stadium, the Tigers’ home, is quite small, holding 3,031 fans at full capacity.
“As you can imagine, the stands aren’t always that full,” Meyer said. “The players try and make up for that. You can hear them chirping a lot.”
Texas is no stranger to battling the elements, from the blistering cold to the high wind gusts instantly killing deep fly balls to the outfield. Meyer noted that depending on the conditions, wind can affect some sure-fire home runs.
“Winds definitely can play a factor,” Meyer said. “Missouri gets windy as hell sometimes. I’m outside, and I’m just getting a face full of wind that has definitely stopped some home runs.”
Getting challenged by the wind, Missouri’s bats are not the biggest home-run hitters, with their bread and butter capitalizing on mistakes and hitting opportune singles and doubles.
“We don’t have a ridiculous amount of home runs,” Meyer said. “It’s definitely more singles, doubles, taking advantage of errors and mistakes.”
Despite his observations on the season for the Tigers, Meyer is staying optimistic for the upcoming series versus the No. 7 team in the nation.
“I think it’s going to be very high scoring if we stay in it — probably,” Meyer said. “I want to predict us to win. I do, let’s say game one 9-8 (Missouri), 13-6 (Texas), game three 11-8 (Missouri).”
