COLUMBIA, Mo. — A month before his second season at Missouri ended with a loss to Army in the Armed Forces Bowl, coach Eli Drinkwitz took stock in how far the Tigers had come on his watch. Heading into the regular-season finale, at Arkansas, the Tigers had secured bowl eligibility but fell short of reaching the preseason’s most ambitious projections.
“When the schedule came out, there was a lot of optimism about what we can accomplish and what the expectations for our team were,” Drinkwitz said on Nov. 22, his team on a two-game winning streak and 6-5 overall. “You don’t really know until you play. After Week 1, I kind of had a different sense of maybe what our team was capable of. The disappointment at Boston College was real and like, OK, this is where we’ve got to really work to improve. We just weren’t improving at the rate that we needed to in the middle of the season.
“We faced a lot of different adversity with injuries and people being out. But that’s football. That’s life. And so I think the way our guys are responding has been a positive. You really can’t outperform the culture and the togetherness of the team. I think the best teams play the best together. We’re starting to figure that out as a culture and a program.”
