Eli Drinkwitz and Missouri Football’s Key to Success

Projected by very few, the Missouri Tigers led by head coach Eli Drinkwitz are off to a 6-1 start in the 2023 season. The Tigers have wins over defending Big 12 champions the Kansas State Wildcats and the Kentucky Wildcats who sit at 6-2. The win over Kentucky specifically was impressive as it was in Lexington, and the Tigers started the game off down 14-0 and came back to win the contest 38-21.

Under Eli Drinkwitz, the Tigers went 5-5, 6-7 and 6-7 in the 2020, 2021 and 2022 seasons. So all signs pointed to a potentially subpar year again in Drinkwitz’s fourth at the school. It’s been everything but. So what’s the reason? Why do the Tigers suddenly seem to be an SEC East contender?

Eli Drinkwitz and Missouri football’s key to success

Missouri recruitment classes under Drinkwitz have improved each year. According to On3’s recruitment rankings, Missouri’s 2020 class was 48th, 2021 was 27th, 18th in 2022 and 22nd in 2023. So far for 2024, the Tigers have the 33rd ranked recruiting class, but it’s early and that number will most likely go up if the trend remains.

As part of their 2024 recruiting class, the Tigers currently have a verbal commitment from Williams Nwaneri. Nwaneri is a defensive end and is the number two recruit in the country for the class of 2024. This is the second five star recruit in over a decade that the Tigers have landed, with the first being under Drinkwitz as well in wide receiver Luther Burden in 2022, who was the third overall recruit for that year according to On3.

Equally as notable, Nwaneri is from Lee’s Summit, Missouri, and Burden from St. Louis, Missouri. In addition to the improvement in recruiting, Drinkwitz is beginning to keep recruits from Missouri, in Missouri.

Burden is producing on the field in only his sophomore season with the Tigers teaming up with senior quarterback Brady Cook. Burden is currently second in the nation in receiving yards with 808 through seven games, while Cook is sixth in the nation with 2,046 passing yards.

Drinkwitz is now showing the nation that when he has good players, he has good teams. Seems like simple logic on the surface, but rebuilding a program takes time, and in year four based on numbers so far, it looks like Drinkwitz is doing that.

As an example for Drinkwitz on a program that was built with good players was Appalachian State where Drinkwitz took over in 2019 for head coach Scott Satterfield who left for the Louisville head coaching position in 2019. In his first season as a head coach at the FBS level, Drinkwitz led the Mountaineers to a 12-1 record building off of the momentum the program had under Satterfield, proving that with the talent, he could get the job done. This propelled Drinkwitz to the head coaching position in Missouri where he took over after one year in Boone coaching the Mountaineers.

These stats speak to the ability of Drinkwitz not only to recruit, but to develop his players. And now that he’s had four years to do so, this seems to be the magic number. Too often now a days, teams and fans expect instantaneous results at programs that need to be rebuilt like Missouri’s did. And therefore part ways with coaches sometimes too quickly. Drinkwitz is an example of why you shouldn’t. Other recent head coaching examples that saw a turnaround in year three or later are below:

• Mike Norvell (Florida State)
• James Franklin (Penn State)
• James Franklin (Formerly Vanderbilt)
• Chip Kelly (UCLA)
• Kyle Whittingham (Utah)
• Kirk Ferentz (Iowa)

While some of these coaches have been at their schools a long time, looking back specifically at the fourth year in their tenures at those schools is when each took off. Each saw an increase in recruiting, developed it and emphasized keeping in-state talent in-state and developed. All of this turned into on-field results. And by the numbers, stats, recruiting classes, records and rankings, that appears to be exactly what Eli Drinkwitz is doing for the Tigers in 2023.