Eli Drinkwitz talks bowl game, offensive coordinator search and state of college football

COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)

College football teams are working in unprecedented times, as programs around the nation juggle preparation for bowl games or the College Football Playoff, roster management, name, image and likeness and so much more...all at once.

Mizzou football coach Eli Drinkwitz can also add searching for a new offensive coordinator to that extensive list, as the team is in the midst of preparation for its first appearance in the TaxSlayer Gator Bowl in nearly 60 years.

As former Tiger offensive coordinator Kirby Moore moves into his role as the head coach at Washington State, Coach Eli said he will not be joining the team in Jacksonville for the bowl game. Instead, he said that his offensive staff will all come together and come up with a game plan against No. 19 Virginia.

"Probably just flip a coin...Each play just flip a coin and see who wants it," Drinkwitz joked when asked who, specifically, would call plays in the Gator Bowl. "We're putting it together. Honestly, staff collaboration is probably one of the best things we do here and how we design and operate and game plan. So, you know, we'll put it together and then, you know, somebody's got to call it and call it the way that they do. We'll work through that the rest of this week, as we're going through who's calling, talking to the quarterback and all that stuff and get a sense of the direction we're going to go there."

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

Coach Moore will be working to assemble his staff at Washington State in the next few weeks and Drinkwitz said there is a possibility they could lose a few more staffers at Mizzou, specifically analysts.

However, Drinkwitz made it clear that he is resting his focus solely one winning the bowl game and ending the 2025 campaign the right way, before he concerns himself with hiring a new offensive coordinator for 2026.

In terms of what he's looking for, one word sums it up: experience.

"This league doesn't allow for training wheels. Like, there's not a lot of first time play callers having a lot of success in this league. You got to have some battle scars, you got to have a little toughness, you got to have an understanding of who you are and what your identity is," he said. "That's going to be a priority in this thing. You know, I've had a lot of people reach out and recommend a lot of people that are are great candidates and great people, but it's going to be somebody who I feel like has been in the fire before and understands it and knows what they're getting into."

The leader of the Tigers also emphasized that improvement in the passing game will be another focus in bringing in a new coordinator.

"You look at our four losses this year and you look at our three losses last year, you look at our two losses the year before that, our inability to consistently convert third downs in critical games or throw the ball has been a major factor in our losses. We got to get that corrected and cleaned up," Drinkwitz said.

Mizzou will face the ACC's runner up with a couple of injuries to note, as well as a few transfers.

Linebacker Josiah Trotter, who sustained a minor injury after the Arkansas game, and tight end Brett Norfleet, who had been grappling with injury all season, will miss the bowl game, after getting those injuries fixed in the last few weeks.

In addition to those injuries, Drinkwitz and company have lost a few guys to the transfer portal, since ending the regular-season at Arkansas at the end of November: wide receiver Joshua Manning, wide receiver James Madison, running back Brenden Haygood, running back Marquise Davis and defensive end Javion Hilson.

"I think we still will have guys enter the portal after the bowl game, but they felt like it was important for them to finish the season, which I respect," Drinkwitz said.

There are also quite a few guys waiting to figure out if they will take the next step and test the waters in the NFL. Coach Eli said that the challenge there is that his players still haven't received reports back from the league, which could impact their decision on if they play in the bowl game or if they opt out. No matter what those reports say, though, he does expect most his seniors to want to play in the Gator Bowl and finish out the season.

Of course, the meaning of bowl games has changed quite a bit over the years, as college football fans have seen programs around the nation, including Notre Dame, Iowa State and others, opt out. Whether it's because they didn't make the College Football Playoff or because they want to start focus on the offseason, bowl games just don't bring the same level of passion that they used to.

However, that hasn't been the case at Mizzou. The Tigers are motivated by the fact that they get to take the field on last time together and finish what they started.

"Just finishing what you started," safety Daylan Carnell said. "This is my team. We came into the season and we was all in this together, right or wrong, good or bad. So, just finishing out what I started with my brothers."

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

MU likes the matchup against Virginia that's coming on Dec. 27, as both defenses are among the top in the country. Mizzou boasts the No. 10 defense in the nation, allowing just 274.8 yards per game, while has the No. 24 unit overall, allowing 313.3 yards per game.

With how well the Tigers' defense matches up with the Cavaliers' offense and vice versa, Coach Drinkwitz said he expects the game to hinge on special teams play.

"We really need to play well on special teams," Drinkwitz said. "We're going to have to do a good job, offensively, of finding a rhythm and what can we do against what they do defensively. [Their offense does] a really good job staying on schedule, there's very few third and long or extra longs. They keep it a third and five or less. We're going to have to really play disciplined football, use our depth to our advantage and try to create disruptive plays."

Mizzou will undoubtedly rely on the play of consensus All-American running back Ahmad Hardy, who is just 70 yards away from breaking the program's single-season rushing yard, which is held by former Tiger star Cody Schrader.

Hardy led the nation in rushing yards per game (130.0) and ranked second in the country in rushing yards (1,560). His 16 rushing scores is No. 4 in the nation, as he finished with 281 more yards than any other back in the conference. In his sophomore campaign, the Mississippi native tallied eight 100-yard games and put up just the sixth 300-yard rushing performance in Southeastern Conference history.

"[In the spring], we already knew he was a great player, but just seeing him in practice is one thing. When you really see him in a game, it's like he's grown and just breaking all the tackles and just having great games each week," offensive lineman Keagen Trost said.

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

Although the postseason honors have been rolling in, left and right, for Hardy, he doesn't always take too much notice. In fact, he said that he doesn't even know what some of the honors that he has gotten are. The Mississippi native did feel pretty good about earning All-American status in his sophomore campaign, though.

"I know All-American is supposed to be like the best player all-around or something like that, so I feel like it's pretty good," he said.

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

Although a lot of the attention has gone to Hardy for his tremendous 2025 season, the Tiger rushing attack wouldn't have been complete without the play of running back Jamal Roberts.

The St. Louis native ended the 2025 regular-season with 697 yards and five touchdowns on 113 carries. Coach Drinkwitz said that keeping him around will be a priority over the course of this offseason, but as the team is dealing with balancing roster retention, what they can pay each player and more...it's become more difficult than ever.

"I think Jamal Roberts is as good a back as there is in the country. How do you how do you beg Jamal to take less [money] to stay here? You know, I mean, that's the that's the real reality of it. We're asking him to commit to a new way and do something different, but that's a really tough decision. That is not easy. That's, you know, that's not the only person. So it's a really, really hard deal because when you have a hard cap, it's like I told the team, you know, when an NFL owner doesn't pay, he gets to keep the money, but nobody in here is keeping any money. Like, we just have a pot of money that we got to divide amongst everybody in here to try to create the strongest team possible. So, that's what we're trying to do and we'll do the best we can. But, if anybody in Saint Louis has third party NIL and feel that they'd like to donate or work to keep Jamal Roberts around, we'd love to talk to you about it, because he's a heck of a player," Drinkwitz emphasized.

Ahead of Mizzou's trip to the TaxSlayer Gator Bowl at the end of the month of December, Drinkwitz was very reflective on the state of college football, as a whole, in his meeting with local media members, on Tuesday.

There's a lot that goes on for football coaches between the time the regular-season ends in November and when bowl games wrap up by January. One of the biggest dates to focus on in January 2nd, when the transfer portal will officially open up and the havoc will begin.

Before that date comes, Drinkwitz and his staff are having conversations with players, talking about contracts and more, but in the face of the wild west of college athletics, he doesn't really know how binding anything is now-a-days. Even if he signs an athlete to a multi-year contract, they don't have to stay.

"Some of the players have entered the portal [from our team], were under two year contracts and their anticipation is that another school will pay their buyout or they'll pay it back themselves. So, you know, contracts are contracts...So we'll see. We'll see. You know, right now there are perceived rules and then we'll figure out what are the real rules moving forward," Drinkwitz said. "All of our two-year contracts have a buyout and so if guys leave with a two-year contract, you know, you enter into the portal with a tag on it that says buyout and the next school is responsible for figuring that out. So, we'll see how that that all plays out in the future. You know, one of the things I've said quite a bit is what we're being asked to do has never been done before in the history of college football, ever. So, there can be a lot of mistakes made and maybe a lot of new ways mapped out moving forward. We have a ton of stability here. We have a ton of really good players."

Over the past few weeks, Coach Drinkwitz has been adamant that there needs to be some changes in college football, especially as it relates to the calendar. The Mizzou head coach said he believes that having the month of December be 'dead,' has been a really good edition, but having one transfer portal window does present quite a few challenges.

"Obviously the bowl games being delayed as long as they are creates a little bit of angst for players. If they already have their minds made up that they want to transfer, so that's a little bit challenging," Drinkwitz said. "I think the biggest challenge with the January-only portal is that you're going to have one crack at the egg. Once you get your roster set, it's set. There's no way to fix it, you know? So, it'll be interesting to see how everybody approaches spring football now moving forward with, you know, you got 105 guys and somebody gets injured, there's no going in the portal to find somebody. So, we'll see how that all plays out. Again, what we're being asked to do every day is a brand new."

There is supposed to be some enforcement of rules coming to college athletics, with the College Sports Commission (CSC) agreement that has yet to be signed by every university. That agreement stems from the House v. NCAA revenue-sharing settlement. Essentially, it would require schools to give the CSC the power enforce the rules from that House settlement, which means that universities would waive any rights to arbitration. The schools must also all cooperate with investigations and accept penalties (post-season bans or revenue loss) for violations.

In short, the CSC would act as a governing body for compliance, which is good in theory, but has yet to come to fruition.

Drinkwitz said that he has been talking to his fellow coaches around the league about the problem, which he said could affect the future of college football. You can find his full statement below.

"There's a lot of coaches discussing it and and frustrated, in my opinion. I understand the national sentiment, because of the salary ranges of head coaches, that it feels like we're complaining. But we're really not. We're trying to sound warning bells. That's what I believe we're all trying to do is that there's a warning that that the system that we're in is really sick right now. College football is sick and...it's just showing signs of this thing really cracking moving forward. We need to get something under control. You know, the SCORE Act was something that that it looked like it was going to be a step in a direction. There is no perfect solution, but we have to get some sort of steps moving in that direction. I think we're all weighted with bated breath trying to wait on what's going to happen with this fifth-year lawsuit in Nashville, where you could have a flurry of of fifth year guys now be ineligible and that would just throw a completely new wrinkle in the system. You know, tampering is at the highest levels. There is no such thing as tampering. It's just because there's nobody's been punished for tampering. Everybody on my roster is being called. I had a dad call me and say that, and I called the head coaches at their schools that this schools, that this school and this school called and they are offering this much money and, you know... you're putting a lot of pressure on young men. You know, we're paying them as 1099 employees, a lot of money. We're not offering any type of retirement. We're not offering any type of health benefits. You know, and we've worked around a system and tried to create that as the system, instead of creating a functioning way of moving forward and making sure that it works for everybody. Whether that's collective bargaining, whether that's making them employees, whether that's anti-trust legislation that protects everybody, you know, the commissioner or the the SEC or the NCAA from lawsuits. Something needs to be done. Because, again, TV viewership may be at an all time high and that's awesome and gambling on sports may be at an all time high and that's great. I got no problem with that. But, what about the well-being of the student athlete? What about graduation rate? What about tax implications? What about handling and understanding financial literacy? What is their life going to look like after five years of college athletics? Is [their life] going to be better because they participated in college athletics, or could they be in a tougher situation? You know, a lot of us got into college athletics because we wanted to help young men grow and develop and I think we're still doing that mission. But, it's getting really hard because you used to talk about...Coach Saban used to talk about all the time creating value for yourself and when he talked about it, he wasn't just talking about value for the NFL. He was talking about creating value for yourself with a college degree and we've lost that aspect of it. These guys are going to create tremendous value for themselves playing the game of football and that's awesome. I love that these guys are getting paid. I love that last week these guys with their own money went out and bought gifts for Coyote Hill. I love that. That's awesome. But, my job also is to look at them in three or four years down the road and how many of them are in a better position because they've played football? If they've transferred four times and, you know, that's just the system that we've created. Not all freedom is good freedom."

Up next - Mizzou will face Virginia in the TaxSlayer Gator Bowl on Saturday, Dec. 27. Kickoff is slated for 6:30 p.m. CT on KMIZ.