Beard Era Begins with Friday Showdown at Kansas

First and Ten

• Missouri State kicks off its 112th season of college football on Friday night when the Bears travel to the University of Kansas to take on the Jayhawks at 7 p.m. The game will air on the Bears Radio Network as well as ESPN+ as part of the Big12 Now package.
• Missouri State boasts seven players from the state of Kansas, including Caden Bolz (LS, Overland Park), Spencer Grosz (K, Olathe), Todric McGee (S, Wichita), Ethan Merrell (LB, Girard), Sterling Smithson (DL, Overland Park), DeAndre Washington (S, Wellington) and Jalen Williams (DL, Overland Park).
• Missouri State is 52-56-3 all-time in season openers. The only other time the Bears have opened the season against Kansas was Sept. 1, 2001 — a 24-10 loss to coach Terry Allen’s Jayhawks in Lawrence.
• The last time Missouri State played a Friday night game was Sept. 3, 2010 in a 31-10 home win over Eastern Kentucky. That game was postponed the night before due to tornado warnings in the Springfield area. The last scheduled Friday night contest involving Missouri State was a 26-13 win at UIC on Oct. 2, 1970.
• Recognized as the first stadium built on a college campus west of the Mississippi River, David Booth Kansas Memorial Stadium is the seventh-oldest collegiate stadium in the nation.
• With a 44.4 career punting average (on 163 attempts), Grant Burkett (Jr., Joplin, Mo.) is the nation’s active career leader at the FCS level heading into the 2023 season. He holds three of Missouri State’s top four single-season punting averages, including a school-record 46.2 average in 2021.
• Jacardia Wright (RB, Decatur, Ill.) Earned MVFC All-Newcomer Team laurels in his first season in Springfield in 2022, ranking 6th in the Valley in rushing yards per game (71.1), 6th in rushing TD’s (9) and 8th in yards per carry (4.56). He became MSU’s first 700-yard rusher since 2014 (Calan Crowder). He is also the club’s top returning pass receiver (23 receptions) from last season. He played two games vs. KU (2020 and 2021) during his time at K-State, but combined for just three rushing attempts against the Jayhawks.
• The Bears have 20 players on the roster this season with experience at the NCAA FBS level, including five wide receivers and 10 newcomers.
• Fourth-year safety P.J. Hall (S, Little Rock, Ark.) garnered preseason attention from Valley head coaches by earning a second-team nod on the Preseason All-MVFC Team. Last season, hall played in 10 games with a pair of starts and racked up 29 tackles in the secondary, including a season-high 7 stops at Northern Iowa (Oct. 22, 2022).
• In a breakout campaign in 2022, Von Young (LB, Buckner, Mo.) finished second on the squad in total tackles (66), which he parlayed into a Preseason All-MVFC honorable mention honor this season. Young started all 11 games a year ago, which gives him the longest active streak of games started on the MoState squad.
• Last season, the Bears held their opponents to just a 36.6 percent conversion rate on third down, which ranked 35th nationally. Likewise, when MoState forced its foes to punt, it averaged 9.50 yards on punt returns which also ranked 35th nationally in the FCS ranks.
• Missouri State’s co-captains for the 2023 season are Grant Burkett (P, Joplin, Mo.), PJ Hall (S, Little Rock, Ark.), Raylen Sharpe (WR, Allen, Texas), Darion Smith (DL, St. Louis, Mo.) and Jacardia Wright (RB, Decatur, Ill.),
• The last Bears head coach to win his debut game was Jesse Branch (9/6/86) with a 17-16 win over Illinois State.
• This is the 34th straight year Missouri State (NCAA Division I FCS) has played at least one FBS program in football. The Bears are 1-39 all-time vs. FBS foes, including a 31-24 victory over UNLV on Sept. 1, 1990.
• The Missouri Valley Football Conference, of which Missouri State is a charter member, has produced 10 of the last 12 national champions at the NCAA Division I FCS level with four national runners-up in that same span. The Bears have been an FCS playoff team in two of the past three seasons.
• MoState is 51-54-6 all-time against 12 Kansas schools, including 53 historical meetings against Pitt State.

Coach Ryan Beard

• Missouri State University officially presented Ryan Beard as its new head football coach on Dec. 19, 2022 during a news conference in Great Southern Bank Arena on the Springfield campus.
• At 34, Beard is the program’s youngest head coach on record and is the 22nd person to hold the football Bears’ top coaching position. His elevation to head coach came on the heels of three seasons as MSU’s defensive coordinator (2020-22) under former head coach Bobby Petrino.
• Beard has played a significant role in Missouri State’s resurgence on the gridiron, managing a defensive unit that has boasted 18 all-conference selections, four All-Americans and three professional players in his tenure at MoState.
• In his first campaign in Springfield in 2020-21, Beard and his defensive unit broke the program record for sacks with 27, created 15 turnovers, and held every Missouri Valley Football Conference foe under 30 points for the first time since 1989. His inaugural season at MSU culminated in five all-conference selections, while the Bears captured a share of the MVFC championship and earned an NCAA playoff berth.
• As an encore effort in 2021, Beard’s second year with the program saw the Bears top the club sack record again (30) while racking up 25 takeaways and securing 15 interceptions. In addition to making a second straight NCAA playoff appearance in 2021, MSU finished in sole possession of second place in the rugged Missouri Valley Football Conference, ranked ninth nationally in turnovers gained and finished 14th in interceptions per game. The 2021 Bears also boasted five all-conference players on the defensive side of the ball while Bears’ defensive lineman Eric Johnson was drafted by the Indianapolis Colts in the fifth round of the 2022 NFL Draft.
• The 2022 Bears defense gave up just 15.8 points per game over their last four games with defensive end Kevin Ellis leading the nation in fumble recoveries, and four MSU defenders earning all-conference laurels. Five-time All-MVFC pick Montrae Braswell signed a free agent deal with the Seattle Seahawks.
• Before coming to Missouri State, Beard spent the 2019 season at Central Michigan as the special teams and safeties coach for head coach Jim McElwain. He joined the Central Michigan staff in February of 2019 and helped lead the Chippewas to an 8-6 campaign on a defensive secondary that created 13 interceptions.
• Beard served as an assistant at Louisville during the 2017 and 2018 seasons, starting as the defensive backs coach and in quality control before moving on to become the Cardinals’ linebackers coach and their co-special teams coordinator. As the defensive backs coach at Western Kentucky in 2016, Beard helped lead the Hilltoppers to the Conference USA championship and a win in the Boca Raton Bowl.
• Beard was a standout defensive back at Western Kentucky himself from 2007-11. He was a two-time All-Sun Belt Conference selection and was named to the league’s All-Freshman squad and its All-Academic team. In 2011, he earned the Western Kentucky Iron Man Award.
• A native of Bowling Green, Ky., Beard was a four-year letterwinner at Bowling Green High for coach Kevin Wallace, where his efforts helped the Purples advance to the state 3A championship contest each of his last two years.
• Beard holds two degrees from Western Kentucky: a bachelor of science in Business Management (2012), and a master of science in Recreation and Sport Administration (2014).
• He is married to the former Katie Petrino. The couple have four children with son Beau and daughter Lainey, in addition to twins Jacob and Kailey born in the spring of 2022.

Series History

• Kansas leads the all-time series, 2-0, with previous meetings in back-to-back seasons (2001 and 2002) at David Booth Kansas Memorial Stadium in Lawrence.
• In the 2001 season opener, (9/1/01), Kansas and coach Terry Allen prevailed, 24-10, despite four Bears takeaways. Missouri State spotted the Jayhawks 14 points out of the gates before pulling within 14-10 on a one-yard run by Austin Moherman late in the second quarter. The Bears came up empty on two red zone trips in the second half, but surrendered just 333 yards of total offense in a hard-fought loss. At the time, the crowd of 37,500 was the third-largest crowd ever for a Bears game.
• The following season (9/14/02), the Bears were within 27-24 with 2:51 left in the third quarter, but could not close the gap down the stretch in a 44-24 setback in Lawrence. KU had a 100-yard kickoff return on the first play of the game, capitalized on a sack-and-fumble return for a TD and had a long punt return to make the difference. Clark Green scored twice in the fourth quarter for the Jayhawks and finished with 131 ground yards.

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