Eli Drinkwitz previews season opener, amidst ongoing quarterback battle

COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)

The Mizzou football team is less than a week away from opening up the 2025 season at Faurot Field, as that game against Central Arkansas will look to answer an important question for head coach Eli Drinkwitz: who will be the Tigers' starting quarterback?

At the conclusion of fall camp, Coach Drink made the announcement that both graduate transfer Beau Pribula and returner Sam Horn will play in the first game of the season. On Saturday, he said he is not going to share the specifics of the plan, but does not expect the competition to carry into week two.

"I feel like both of them need to play football. I think they both demonstrated the ability of toughness, preparation, decision-making, accuracy and leadership in a practice setting, but that doesn't mean they've done it in a game setting for us," Drinkwitz said when asked about what he needs to see from his quarterbacks. "I know both of them have played college football before, but they haven't played it in this situation before and so they'll get to demonstrate that this week."

You can watch the full press conference with Coach Eli in the video player below.

Drinkwitz said that both quarterback played so well through fall camp that the decision was too close to call and he didn't want to rush it.

"I think they've both established a leadership with the team, as evidenced by both being voted captains, and just didn't feel like I could make a decision without a little bit more information," he said.

Coach Drinkwitz also took some time to dive into their first opponent, as the University of Central Arkansas (UCA) Purple Bears will be in Columbia on Thursday.

He said the first game of the season, when you don't know too much about your opponent yet, is always a challenge. However, Mizzou does know that Central Arkansas will definitely be establishing the run, as 5-foot-11, 215-pound sophomore running back Landen Chambers is expected to play quite a bit for the Bears in 2025.

UCA head coach Nathan Brown is taking over the play-calling responsibilities for the upcoming season, which means Coach Eli and his staff have been reviewing old tape from when Brown played for the Purple Bears.

"You know, Nathan threw the ball around a lot as a quarterback, so I'm assuming he's going to want to get back to doing that. I feel like the comments there were made that they didn't have enough variety or explosiveness on offense, so look forward to them trying to bring back some explosive style of play," Drinkwitz said.

The Purple Bears also have a freshman All-American wide receiver to watch out for, one with a history with Coach Eli.

"Really exciting opportunity for me, personally. Malachi Henry...I coached with his dad Mo at Springdale for several years from 2006 to 2009. Malachi would have been four or five at the time. So awesome to see his career and development. I'm excited to face him and watch him chase his dream as a Division I football player," Coach Drinkwitz said.

With all that talent on Central Arkansas' offense, Drinkwitz said for his defense it all starts with stopping the run, in addition to having success rushing the passer without having to get too 'exotic.'

"I want to see if we can establish the ability to affect the passer," he said. "I think we want to see what kind of coverage ability we have. Can we be a team that denies the ball or do we have to be a team that has a touchdown-proof defense and just try to keep everything in front of us? Can we force takeaways? Do we tackle well? There's a lot of things to figure out."

Defensive tackle Chris McClellan mimicked the same message as his head coach, as he said that the defensive line would love to go out there on Thursday and just use their natural abilities to dominate the opponent.

"Being able to go out there and just rush the passer, without having to do a bunch of fancy twists games or anything like that is going to be really fun for us this year," McClellan said.

You can watch the full press conference with McClellan in the video player below.

The senior added that throughout fall camp he was able to really see the depth and talent that Mizzou brought onto the defense for the 2025 season. He described the unit as a bunch of 'spark plugs.' Essentially, a group of guys that all have an ability to make plays and affect opposing offenses.

The Tigers are expecting sophomore running back Ahmad Hardy to be a guy that'll have quite a bit of success affecting opposing defense in his first season in Columbia.

Throughout fall camp, MU defensive standouts have said that, hands down, Hardy is the toughest guy to bring down in all of the running back room. Although he has the confidence of his teammates, Hardy does recognize that there will be an adjust to playing at the Southeastern Conference level, coming from Louisiana-Monroe.

"I don't know what to expect, but just work hard and do everything that we've been doing and trust the process," Hardy said.

You can watch the full press conference with Hardy in the video player below.

Mizzou will kickoff the 2025 season on Thursday, Aug. 28 at 6:30 pm at Faurot Field.