The 1943 Missouri Tigers football team was an

American football American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team with ...

team that represented the

University of Missouri The University of Missouri (Mizzou, MU, or Missouri) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Columbia, Missouri. It is Missouri's largest university and the flagship of the four-campus Universit ...

in the

Big Six Conference The Big Eight Conference was a National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA)-affiliated Division I-A college athletic association that sponsored football. It was formed in January 1907 as the Missouri Valley Intercollegiate Athletic Associatio ...

(Big 6) during the

1943 college football season The 1943 college football season was the 75th season of intercollegiate football in the United States. Competition included schools from the Big Ten Conference, the Pacific Coast Conference (PCC), the Southeastern Conference (SEC), the Big Six ...

. The team compiled a 6–3 record (3–2 against Big 6 opponents), finished in a tie for second place in the Big 6, and outscored all opponents by a combined total of 170 to 142.

Chauncey Simpson Chauncey Simpson (December 21, 1901 – April 20, 1970) was an American college football, college basketball, and track and field coach. He was the interim head football coach at University of Missouri from 1943 to 1945 while Don Faurot, the stan ...

was the head coach for the first of three seasons. The team played its home games at Memorial Stadium in

Columbia, Missouri Columbia is a city in the U.S. state of Missouri. It is the county seat of Boone County and home to the University of Missouri. Founded in 1821, it is the principal city of the five-county Columbia metropolitan area. It is Missouri's fourth ...

. The team's leading scorers were Bill Dellastatious and

Don Reece Donald Miles "Bull" Reece (December 1, 1919 – August 26, 1992) was an American football fullback. Reece was born in Marysville, Ohio, in 1919 and attended Marysville High School in that city. He played college football at Missouri. He play ...

, each with 36 points. In the final

Litkenhous Ratings The Litkenhous Difference by Score Ratings system was a mathematical system used to rank football and basketball teams. The Litrating system was developed by Vanderbilt University professor Edward E. Litkenhous (1907 – December 22, 1984) and his b ...

, Missouri ranked 56th among the nation's college and service teams with a rating of 81.8.

Don Faurot Donald Burrows Faurot (June 23, 1902 – October 19, 1995) was an American football and basketball player, coach, and college athletics administrator best known for his eight-decade association with the University of Missouri. He served as the ...

, who had been the team's head coach since 1935, stepped down in June 1943 to join the

United States Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage ...

during World War II.

, who had been the school's head track coach and a backfield coach for the football team, was appointed to serve as "acting football coach" during Faurot's military service. Simpson remained in charge of the team for three years from 1943 to 1945.

Schedule

References

Missouri Missouri is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. Ranking List of U.S. states and territories by area, 21st in land area, it is bordered by eight states (tied for the most with Tennessee ...

Missouri Tigers football seasons

Missouri Tigers football The Missouri Tigers football program represents the University of Missouri (often referred to as Mizzou) in college football and competes in the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). Missouri's ...

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