Anonymous SEC coach believes 10-win season puts Eli Drinkwitz on coaching short lists

Eli Drinkwitz has completely changed his tenure with what they’ve accomplished the past pair of seasons at Missouri. That said, if he has a third year like those two, the Tigers could be needing to have a coaching search next offseason.

Athlon Sports recently released their preview magazine for next season, including a segment with anonymous quotes from coaches from around the SEC. When it came to Mizzou, the anonymous coaches said that Drinkwitz should be one more ten-win record away from getting other job offers in college football because of what he has done in CoMo.

“One of the most underrated coaching staffs in the entire country,” they said. “If they can flip the QB and rework the offensive line and win another 10 games, Eli (Drinkwitz) should be on everyone’s short list.”

“This isn’t an overly talented roster right now and might not win as many games, but the program’s health and identity are strong,” said another. “Eli really carved out a spot in the SEC and built a reliable winner.”

Drinkwitz has now been at Missouri since the turn of the decade. His start wasn’t much with a record of 17-19 (.472) overall, going 2-9 against ranked competition, from 2020 through 2022. They went .500 in his debut against just a conference schedule but finished with losing records in his second and third seasons after respective losses in their bowl games. That, at the time, had him on a bit of a hot seat going into his fourth year.

However, over 2023 and 2024, the Tigers are 21-5 (.808) overall, going 11-2 in 2023 and 10-3 in 2024 for two of the better records in program history. That’d have them in contention in the SEC and to make the College Football Playoff but, while making neither, they did go on to win both bowl games they’d appear in against Ohio State in the Cotton Bowl and Iowa in the Music City Bowl.

Missouri has lost and had to replace a lot from those two teams now going into this fall. Still, if they go on to win several games again, even reaching double-digits, there is a scenario where, depending on the jobs that open up elsewhere on the coaching carousel, Drinkwitz could become a candidate for other jobs if he so chose to leave Columbia.

Drinkwitz has shifted the opinion of him, through six seasons now as a collegiate head coach, with what’s been accomplished the last two seasons by Missouri. Three consecutive records of ten-plus wins, though, could put him in a different place after the season with what jobs open and which could consider him a target in their search.