That's later. As that final weekend of regular season play approached, the storyline from head coach Mark Farley hasn't changed since the victory at Southern Illinois. Let everybody else worry about the playoffs, Farley said. Our team is digging in, buried in the season, trying to beat the next team on the schedule.

"I think that's pretty much hitting it right on the head," said Williams, the senior and team leader in sacks. "Nobody's even talking about the playoffs yet. We've been focusing on this next game thing. It's been like that probably since the Illinois State game. We just know we had a chance.

"Everybody knows we have a chance to make the playoffs and everything, but everybody is thinking we have to take care of this one game, this one game."

Farley said Monday he's been so focused on Missouri State, he didn't even talk about the senior class during a mid-week team meeting.

"You look up and it's the last (regular season) game," he said. "That's how much we've been buried in this, in all sincerity."

But he also took a few minutes Monday to praise his veterans. Farley noted that the upperclassmen have endured a lot, from season-ending injuries that sidelined Brett LeMaster and Jake Farley to the death of Kevin Vereen's mother.