Ahmad Hardy was one of the best running backs in college football last year, finishing No. 2 in the country in rushing with 1,649 yards and 16 touchdowns while earning first-team All-American honors in his first season at Missouri. Now he's still working his way back from a gunshot wound that has nothing to do with football at all.
Per ESPN's Pete Thamel, Hardy hasn't practiced yet this fall and the target for his return is mid-September. That's a significant runway of uncertainty for a Missouri offense that leaned on him heavily a year ago. Hardy was hit by a bullet in the upper leg back in May at an outdoor concert in Laurel, Mississippi, with the bullet striking bone, and he's been rehabbing ever since.
The mid-September timeline is bad news on the calendar. Missouri opens the season against Arkansas-Pine Bluff, then heads to Kansas on September 11 — both games Hardy will almost certainly miss if the target holds. Worse, the Tigers' SEC opener at Mississippi State lands September 26, meaning the guy who was arguably their best offensive weapon could be sidelined for the toughest early test on the schedule too.
He earned first-team All-American honors last year and finished No. 2 in the nation in rushing. Missouri opens with Arkansas-Pine Bluff and plays at Kansas on Sept. 11. First league game is at Miss State on Sept. 26.
That second Thamel tweet lays out exactly what Missouri stands to lose if this drags. Hardy wasn't just productive, he was the engine of an 8-5 season that had the Tigers feeling good about where the program is headed. Coach Eli Drinkwitz has been optimistic about the recovery, saying he expects Hardy to come back even better than before given how he's attacked rehab — but optimism doesn't get him on the field for a Week 1 or Week 2 kickoff.
For now Missouri has to plan around a hole in the backfield to open the year, with the hope that a healthy Hardy shows up in time for the meat of the SEC schedule. Given how close mid-September sits to that Miss State date, there's not much margin for the timeline to slip any further.