When Eli Drinkwitz was hired to be Missouri’s 33rd head coach in program history, what was your baseline expectation for him? Yes, I’m talking to you.
Personally, I wasn’t expecting the world of a guy who had exactly one year of head coaching experience and a smattering of jobs within the Arthur Gustav Malzahn III coaching tree. Hell, I wasn’t even sure Barry Odom should have been fired at the time. What I really wanted was Missouri to get back to the level of where Gary Pinkel took them from the early
aughts to the mid-2010s — the type of program that always wins more than it loses while mounting occasional challenges to college football’s hierarchy. In December of 2019, before NIL and before the House Settlement and before everything that makes up the world we know today, that seemed the most reasonable thing I could expect of any coach, much less a guy coming to town with a light CV.
As for Eli Drinkwitz? I’m sure he had something of a vision for what he’s built at Mizzou in 5+ seasons, but I sometimes wonder if he expected things to go this well. Missouri is 25-5 over the past 2.25 seasons, good for one of the best overall records in college football during that timespan. They’re a threat on the high school recruiting trail, one of the gold standard programs in transfer portal recruiting and, in general, one of the nation’s programs on the rise. That’s a loaded term, I’m sure, but I think we can agree its warranted at this point.
If you had to sum up Drink’s first five years at the helm in Columbia with a word, it might be, “elevation.” From 2020 to 2025, Mizzou has elevated itself from a scrappy, perennial lower class program to one that’s knocking on the door of the SEC’s second-tier. Two consecutive 10-win seasons, bowl wins over Big 10 stalwarts like Ohio State and Iowa, as well as regularly luring elite talent to the program will do that for you. Drinkwitz has navigated every change to the college football landscape with the aplomb Mizzou fans could’ve only dreamed of when he moved to CoMo.
Now, another change is imminent, with the SEC set to move to a nine-game conference schedule starting next season. Gone are the days of playing multiple cupcakes on the runway to a schedule featuring annual visits to and from South Carolina, Vanderbilt, Kentucky and other former SEC East rivals. Now the Tigers will be seeing Oklahoma and Texas A&M every season, with annual trips to and from the conference’s heavy-hitters. On Tuesday, the school announced the next four years of in-conference programming. And all things considered, it’s a favorable draw for the Tigers.
Perhaps its because we can’t know what the future holds for Mizzou or any other SEC program and we only have this present moment on which to draw our conclusions — but it’s easy to look at the next four years of Tiger football and think Eli Drinkwitz and Mizzou’s upward can continue.
In a quick examination of the schedules, only 2027 looks like it’ll be a real challenge. Going to Tuscaloosa, Death Valley, Norman, Columbia Least and College Station is a murderous run, not to mention drawing Tennessee and Auburn at home. Thankfully, analyzing the roster suggests the Tigers should (potentially) be in a transition period, so a tough run in 2027 isn’t the end of the world.
Apart from that, however? The Tigers are well set up to aim for more upward mobility. Only one road game in 2026 immediately stands out as a mountainous challenge, while the Tigers should be able to catch a rebuilding Florida, Oklahoma, Texas and A&M at home. Trips to Austin and Gainesville won’t be fun in 2028, but who knows where the latter program will be in its endless cycle of death and rebirth. And while 2029’s schedule looks daunting right now, one would think Mizzou’s momentum in 2025 and (ideally) 2026 could vault them into a cycle where a balanced, talented squad could be ready for visits from the Tide and Bayou Bengals, as well as trips to Norman, the Plains, Rocky Top and College Station. Mizzou is scratching on the door of being in the same breathe as most of those schools these days, and its not inconceivable that Drinkwitz could continue to build toward with another five years under his belt.
Again, this is all predicated on guess work. We don’t know what the future holds anymore than we did when Drinkwitz put pen to paper pre-COVID. But Mizzou is looking like one of the most stable, sure bets in SEC football right now. Drinkwitz has been able to elevate the Tigers to higher ground in short succession. Who knows what he could accomplish in another five years, especially with manageable schedules on the table.
