Mocking a non-abstract method of an abstract class

I am trying to unit-test a class that extends an abstract base class. Here are the "similar classes" for illustration purposes:

public class MyAbstractBaseClass {
  @Autowired
  private WaterFilter waterFilter;

  protected List<String> filterComponents(List<String> allComponents) {
    return waterFilter.filter(allComponents);
  }
}

public class MyDerivedClass extends MyAbstractBaseClass {
  public List<String> filterWater(List<String> allWaterComponents) {
    List<String> filteredComponents = this.filterComponents(allWaterComponents); //calls abstract class's filterComponets()
    filteredComponents.add("something-else");
    return filteredComponents;
  }
}

Here is the unit test I am trying:

    @RunWith(EasyMockRunner.class)
    public class MyDerivedClassTest {
        @TestSubject
        private MyDerivedClassTest SUT;

        @Before
        public void setup() {
           SUT = new MyDerivedClassTest();
        }

        @Test
        public void test filterWater_HappyCase() {
           //I want to mock my abstract class's filterComponents() method
           //I am trying this:
           EasyMock.expect(SUT.filterComponents(getDummyComponents())).andReturn(getSomeComponents());

          //What to replay here?
          //EasyMock.replay(...)

          List<String> actualResult = SUT.filterWater(getDummyComponents());

          //assert something
          //What to verify?
          //EasyMock.verify(...)
    }
}

When I run this test, I get java.lang.NullPointerException in MyAbstractBaseClass.filter(allComponents)

I understand that the autowired "waterFilter" is not getting initialized. But then, I just want to mock the "non-abstract" method of the abstract class in my unit test.

How should I go about this using EasyMock? Also, I don't know what to replay() and verify().