The Tigers have Something to Prove; but not to those outside the program
Eli Drinkwitz began his time on stage at SEC Media Days in typical style, rolling out one-liners that have earned him admiration and also notoriety across the college football world.
“Y’all remind me a little bit of Disneyworld: tired, ready to go home, tired of coaches whining up here,” he said addressing the reporters that had gathered for his early morning appearance.
The comedy act continued for a brief minute or two, before the Tigers’ head ball coach transitioned to the more serious side with a quote that is (unsurprisingly) already making the rounds on social media.
“With that, I know there’s a lot of burning questions in this room by the 14 of y’all that showed up (smiling). Just as a reminder, I’m not going to answer any questions about the Epstein files, the Radiation Belt, [or] whether or not it was possible for Lee Harvey Oswald to get three shots off in seven seconds,” he said, “I will answer questions about Mizzou football.”
The rest of Mizzou’s media day made it clear the team understands there’s serious business to attend to in 2025.
“We want to make the College Football Playoff. We want to make the SEC Championship game. We want to compete for championships, as many as we can,” Daylan Carnell said in his media appearance, “And for myself, I just want to leave it all out on the field.”
The Tigers, sporting one of the SEC’s most manageable schedules, have their eyes set on a first-ever College Football Playoff appearance. But Zion Young also brought up the one number on seemingly everyone’s mind entering the squad’s next campaign: 10.
“I feel like there’s more to come: I feel like another double-digit season is on the way,” he said, “I feel good, man.”
The 2025 team has the opportunity to do what two prior squads, 2009 and 2015, could not: record a third consecutive 10-win season for the first time in program history.
It’s clear that Mizzou’s players and coaching staff feel they have a defense built to do exactly that.
“Fast and physical; every day they bring it,” Connor Tollison said. “They ain’t got no off days.”
Young is also bullish about the defense, where he is expected to play a key role along the line: “The depth is unreal. Like you said, we’re really establishing a Death Row Defense,” he said. “I know you’ve all seen a lot of that last year and the year before that, but the best is yet to come and it’s on its way.”
But the team’s offense still has remaining questions, namely at the quarterback position – where the battle between Beau Pribula and Sam Horn is far from over.
Horn’s fall to the 17th round of the MLB Draft, despite being a top-150 draft prospect in MLB Pipeline’s rankings, made his commitment to the gridiron and the quarterback battle clear.
“Sam has been adamant this whole time to compete and win the job in the SEC, play quarterback at the highest level,” Drinkwitz said. “I told him the day he got drafted I was proud of him, and I would see him at 6:30 workouts in the morning.”
The former four-star recruit has plenty of competition in Pribula, another blue-chipper who entered the spring as the presumed favorite after transferring in from Penn State.
“When we first talk about recruits, it’s all about the right fit for us: focus, intangibles, talent and tough, Drinkwitz said, “When you talk about the quarterback position, there are five traits you’re looking for. Beau had those traits.”
Even more focus, however, was set on avoiding the mistakes that sunk the 2024 squad’s CFP hopes.
The Tigers sport a 27-7 home record during Drinkwitz’s tenure as head coach and have gone an impressive 13-1 in Columbia the last two seasons, establishing Faurot Field as a formidable environment for opponents.
Mizzou’s road record since 2020? A far less formidable 8-15, though that mark improves to 5-4 since 2023.
The team’s three road losses in 2024 including drubbings at the hands of Alabama and Texas A&M, a loss that quickly cooled their playoff hopes and still weighed heavily on the minds of each Tigers representative in Atlanta.
“What do I not remember from that game, you feel me?,” Young said. “They beat us bad.”
“I wish I didn’t remember it, it was a really bad game for us,” Carnell added. “But I remember it was probably one of the loudest environments, if not the loudest, that I’ve played in.”
Drinkwitz pointed to the new look of last year’s squad compared to the 2023 group, which went 3-1 in road games, as a reason for the blowout in College Station.
“I feel like I let our team down by being unprepared to go to Texas A&M on the road. With the adjustment of the transfer portal and players, I don’t think they understood the routine and what it was going to be,” he said, “We were a step slow in just about everything we did, starting with me in the decision-making processes in our players.”
Drinkwitz said the team is planning to incorporate more preparation for road environments into fall practices this season, including plans to simulate the full experience of a road game. These plans could turn out to be crucial, as the team begins the year with six consecutive home games and will not have any opportunities for a road trip before stepping into a hostile SEC environment.
He also acknowledged that the 2025 team faces some of the same issues as last year’s squad with 38 new scholarship players, though 21 of those additions come from the portal and have high-major or starting experience.
Part of his solution to recreating cohesion with so many new faces already took place over the summer, when 41 players and 15 staff members went on a service trip into the mountains of Jamaica. The group spent four days building a home and bathroom, alongside repairing roofs and adding a room to the local medical center.
“Nothing builds cohesion and trust and respect like shared adversity, putting people in adverse situations, see how they’ll respond,” he said. “There’s nothing more adverse than putting 300-pound offensive linemen, defensive linemen in bunk beds with no air conditioning.”
The trip didn’t just have an impact on the team as a group of football players and coaches, though.
“We wanted to have an impact on them, but in truth, they had more of an impact on us,” he said. “It changed us. It made us different. It made us realize that we’re very thankful for the opportunities we have.”
It’s all part of the process to prepare the team for another big campaign, where they face both internal and external pressure and expectations to achieve the coveted goals above.
“If you get caught up, Coach Saban calls it rat poison,” Drinkwitz said on those external expectations, “I think it’s rat poison either way. Praise and blame are both the same: you can’t care about it either way.”
Mizzou has used the term ‘Something to Prove’ with great success over the last two seasons, and it’s one that isn’t expected to leave anytime soon. But Drinkwitz believes responding to the outside noise can only take a team so far.
“In the key moments it’s more about the belief in each other,” he said. “That’s really what drives us: it’s our belief in our brotherhood, in our Elite Edge program, our belief in our ‘always compete’ mentality, the development of trust and respect we have with each other. It’s having fun while we’re doing this that really drives us in our success.”
The shift to looking inward instead of outward, and deafening the outside noise that surrounds every SEC program, extends to Drinkwitz himself.
“In my first couple years, I cared what y’all thought about me. Now I don’t; I don’t care,” he said. “I’m here to represent my family, my wife and my four beautiful daughters. I’m here to represent the University of Missouri and make our football team proud. Outside of that, I really don’t care what anybody else thinks.”