To put it lightly, Mizzou’s 2017 recruiting class is nothing to write home about.

After landing a total of seven 4-star recruits and one 5-star recruit (DT Terry Beckner Jr.) in the past three years, the Tigers are going through a drought this cycle.

On the night before National Signing Day, coach Barry Odom and his staff have yet to land even a 4-star recruit and have a class filled with 3-star prospects.

Mizzou is one of only two SEC teams, along with Vanderbilt, yet to sign at least one 4-star player for the 2017 class.

Still, being in the SEC helps, as the Tigers can boast the No. 48 overall recruiting class in the country, ahead of schools like Washington State, West Virginia, Houston and other talented programs.

However, to stay out of the SEC East basement, Mizzou has a lot of work to do ahead of Wednesday’s National Signing Day.

As Odom and the Tigers approach that significant date on the calendar, let’s take a look at the work they’ve done on the recruiting trail thus far.

SEC rank: 12
Overall rank: 48

5-stars: 0
4-stars: 0
3-stars: 21

Did they own the state? Not exactly. Though the Tigers could (and should) still land the state’s top prospect, 4-star DE Chester Graves of Kansas City, they only have one other top-10 recruit from Missouri (3-star ATH Daron Davis).

Meanwhile, Illinois, under Lovie Smith, has fared much better in the St. Louis area, landing the top two prospects from the land of the Gateway Arch.

Of course, as mentioned above, Mizzou can still retain home-state dominance if they land Graves on Wednesday.

Current top player: 3-star ATH Daron Davis

Davis is important for other reasons than just being one of the top players in the state of Missouri.

The talented athlete would be a versatile addition to aN offense that lacked creativity at times last season.

Having a guy who can consistently run good routes and catch the ball out of the backfield (in sort of a Ty Montgomery of the Green Bay Packers mold) would be a huge boost for offensive coordinator Josh Heupel and QB Drew Lock.

Still chasing: 4-star DE Chester Graves

Landing Graves is a must in order to prevent this year’s class from being an embarrassment. The Kansas City product has a chance to be Mizzou’s next great defensive lineman — a tradition that has spanned from Justin Smith to Kony Ealy to Sheldon Richardson to Michael Sam, Markus Golden, Shane Ray, Charles Harris and others.

With new defensive line coach Brick Haley on board, the sky’s the limit for future Mizzou defensive linemen.

Best unit: Offensive line. The Tigers already have a young and talented line, but now they’ll have even more depth at the position in 2017.

Besides landing 3-star JUCO transfer Yasir Durant, Mizzou is also bringing in high school 3-star prospects Case Cook, Hyrin White, Pompey Coleman and Larry Borom to provide extra bodies at a position where extra bodies are always valuable.

RB Damarea Crockett and Lock will definitely enjoy playing behind this group of big guys for the next couple of years.

Biggest area of need filled: Secondary. Losing a pair of corners like Aarion Penton and John Gibson will definitely hurt a defense that struggled across the board last year, but the Tigers seemingly targeted replenishing the secondary this offseason.

With 3-star CBs Terry Petry and Adam Sparks and 3-star safeties like Joshuah Bledsoe and Jordan Ulmer in the class, there should be increased depth in the defensive backfield next season.

Better or worse than last year? So far, the Tigers’ 2017 recruiting class is worse than last year, when it finished No. 43 nationally. However, there’s a good chance Mizzou will receive a big boost on National Signing Day if Odom can persuade Graves to come to Columbia.

Still, outside of Davis, there don’t appear to be many other potential 4-star recruits considering the Tigers after a pair of sub-.500 seasons.

To get back to a bowl game and begin piling together some more respectable recruiting classes, the Tigers need to rely on some unheralded prospects like they did in 2005, when a certain 3-star quarterback by the name of Chase Daniel rose to prominence and led Mizzou to a golden age of football.