Kansas vs. Missouri: 2 predictions, best bets for Border War return

After more than a decade off, the Border War is finally back.

While College GameDay chose Norman for its backdrop on Saturday morning, there’s little doubt college football’s most intense atmosphere in Week 2 will emanate from Columbia, Missouri. This will be the 121st meeting all-time between KU and Mizzou and these programs have been shockingly even through the decades. Missouri holds a 57-54-9 all-time lead in the KU-Mizzou series.

Kansas vs. Missouri betting preview, analysis

Here’s what you should know about the Jayhawks and Tigers before kickoff:

Kansas fact sheet

• Kansas has played twice already, blowing out Fresno State in Week 0 and Wagner in Week 1. The victory over Fresno State has aged pretty well already — the Bulldogs thrashed Georgia Southern last weekend. 
• Quarterback Jalon Daniels is back for another season and seems to be healthy. Originally a class of 2020 signee, Daniels is in his sixth year with the Jayhawks. He’s attempted over 900 career passes at the collegiate level (tied for 9th among active quarterbacks). 
• Besides Daniels, Kansas doesn’t have much returning production. Even with its starting QB back, the Jayhawks rank 47th in offensive returning production, per ESPN. They’re at No. 84 on the defensive side of the ball in that category. 
• Receivers Emmanuel Henderson and Cam Pickett seem to be KU’s best options in that room. Both have already gone over 100 yards for the season and have scored multiple touchdowns. 
• Defense was a massive weakness for KU in 2024. The Jayhawks ranked outside of the top 100 in EPA-per-play, according to Game on Paper. They were one of only a handful of power-conference teams to concede more than 6 yards per play last season. 
• Despite those struggles, KU didn’t make massive changes to its defensive staff. Play-caller Brian Borland retired this past offseason and was replaced by co-defensive coordinator DK McDonald. Lance Leipold’s only other move was to bring in Brandon Shelby to coach defensive backs. Shelby was an analyst for KU during the 2024 season. 
• Kansas will have its third offensive play caller in 3 years. Andy Kotelnicki left for Penn State after the 2023 campaign. He was replaced by Jeff Grimes, who is now the OC at Wisconsin. KU will have Jim Zebrowski and Matt Lubick serve as co-offensive coordinators in 2025. 

Missouri fact sheet

• Mizzou has won 10 games in back-to-back seasons under Eli Drinkwitz.
• The Tigers had a lengthy quarterback battle this offseason between Penn State transfer Beau Pribula and veteran backup Sam Horn. That competition was expected to continue into Week 1, but Horn suffered a serious injury on his first snap of the season. 
• That paves the way for Pribula to be the guy for Mizzou in 2025. Known mostly as a runner, Pribula passed for 283 yards and 2 touchdowns in Missouri’s season-opener against Central Arkansas. 
• Missouri lost a ton of production at receiver with Luther Burden III and Theo Wease turning pro. Its main offseason addition to that room is Kevin Coleman Jr., who went for over 900 last season at Mississippi State. He caught 6 passes for 48 yards in the opener. 
• Running back Ahmad Hardy is expected to be a big-time playmaker for Mizzou this season. He rushed for over 1,300 yards last season as a true freshman at Louisiana-Monroe. He also led the Sun Belt with 13 touchdown runs. 
• Defensively, Mizzou brought in several impact transfers to help shore up losses to the NFL. The top addition is edge rusher Damon Wilson II, who was productive at Georgia last season (6 tackles for loss and 3 sacks). 

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Kansas vs. Missouri best bets

I’m going to target a derivative market with this pick — fourth quarter total. The reason is that Kansas and Mizzou were both terrible offensively in the fourth quarter last season (and haven’t been good in previous years, either). When tied or trailing after 3 quarters, Mizzou averaged 4.91 yards per play last season in the final stanza. Kansas was even worse at 4.1 yards per play. Both of those teams ranked outside the top 90 in that category. I’m a big believer in Mizzou’s defense and I’m optimistic KU will be much better on that end this season. Offensively, there’s still so much unknown about Pribula and KU’s new pieces that I’m willing to fade both teams in the fourth quarter. 

Pick: Fourth quarter total under 13.5 points (+105 on DraftKings)

Mizzou had a good defense last season under Corey Batoon, but there was a pretty significant weakness — the QB run game. The Tigers gave up 30+ rushing yards to quarterbacks in 6 of their 8 SEC games last season (including sack yardage, which counts against QB rushing numbers in college). Without sack yardage, Mizzou conceded 50+ rushing yards to 5 different SEC quarterbacks last year. Enter Jalon Daniels, who averaged 36.6 rushing yards per game last season. Daniels also doesn’t take many sacks. In 2024, he posted a sack rate of 3.2%, which ranked 13th out of 81 FBS quarterbacks who threw at least 300 passes. 

Pick: Jalon Daniels over 29.5 rushing yards (-114 on FanDuel)

Spenser Davis

Spenser is a news editor for Saturday Down South and covers college football across all Saturday Football brands.