In the minutes after Missouri’s loss at Boston College on Saturday, a sullen Eli Drinkwitz appeared out of answers when asked about his team’s defensive performance. It wasn’t hard to understand the source of his frustration; Missouri’s run defense, which entered the game worst in the country among Power Five teams, had just been gashed for 275 yards and three touchdowns on the ground in the 41-34 defeat.
Asked if the issues stemmed more from scheme or personnel, Drinkwitz essentially said nothing went right.
“We have who we have, and we have to adjust our scheme to make it match,” he said. “We can’t repeatedly give up 275 yards and be successful.”
By Tuesday, Drinkwitz had adjusted his tone. During a much more chipper press conference with local media, Drinkwitz said it’s not yet time to panic about Missouri’s defense, noting that defensive coordinator Steve Wilks has still coached just four games since replacing Ryan Walters and installing a new scheme.
“We’re four weeks into a new defensive scheme, and it’s going to get better,” Drinkwitz said. “It’s going to get better, we’re going to get better. We’re all learning it, we’re all pushing this thing in the right direction, so I’m not going to hit the panic button. Nobody’s going to hit the panic button. We’re going to get our players’ confidence back, we’re going to continue to work to improve our techniques and fundamentals and we’re going to move on to Tennessee.”
Drinkwitz said the bulk of Missouri’s defensive issues have stemmed from “not being on the same page.” He said responsibility for that starts not with Wilks but himself, part of a clear push to deflect blame away from Wilks and preach patience among fans. He pointed out that the Tigers made costly mistakes both on offense and special teams against Boston College, as well.
“After watching the tape, there was a lot of things that needed to be corrected, but honestly, it really started mostly with me in making sure that, as the head football coach, I’ve got everybody in sync and everybody in rhythm, that I’m doing a good job of making sure that the whole thing is functioning properly,” Drinkwitz said. “There’s some mistakes that were made, some missed tackles, but I think the biggest thing was communication and making sure we were all on the same page of what we were supposed to execute on that play. That starts with me. My challenge to our staff is let’s make sure that all 11 guys are acting as one on defense and that we can play fast.”
When Wilks spoke to reporters, he put more of the blame on his own shoulders, saying he has to “do a better job of putting these guys in position to be successful.” But he also echoed Drinkwitz’s sentiment that it’s not time to sound the alarms just yet, and that the unit quickly put the Boston College loss behind it.
“You can’t panic,” Wilks said. “You’re talking how you respond? Well, I’m going to respond by not panicking. We’re going to re-teach it, we’re going to continue to emphasize fundamentals and details, get these guys in here, extra extra walk-throughs, extra meetings. Whatever we gotta do, and that’s what we’ve been doing. So hopefully we’ll see the results this weekend.”
For fans, it might seem difficult not to panic, to hold out hope that a defense that got manhandled up front by both Boston College and Kentucky can turn things around. The numbers are admittedly bleak. Missouri now ranks No. 129 out of 130 FBS teams against the run, allowing an average of 271.0 yards per game on the ground. Plus, the next test doesn’t get much easier. Coached by former Missouri offensive coordinator Josh Heupel, Tennessee will bring an up-tempo, spread offense to Columbia this Saturday. While Heupel’s units were more known for the gaudy passing numbers put up by Drew Lock during his two seasons at Missouri, the Volunteers have leaned more on the ground game this season. Tennessee has averaged 204.3 rushing yards during its first four games of the season, which ranks No. 32 nationally.
But Drinkwitz preached patience, both for this season and beyond. He assured that Wilks and the rest of the coaching staff will continue to make adjustments and eliminate some of the defensive mistakes that have led to big plays across the team’s first four games. He also acknowledged that Missouri is limited right now because of the talent, or lack thereof, on the roster. That’s not something that can be fixed overnight. Recruiting players and developing them physically into SEC contributors takes time.
“There's no instant oatmeal for a football program,” Drinkwitz said. “So there's some things that we can fix right now, there's approaches that we can fix. Whether it's not getting penalties on certain situations, whether it's calling better plays, whether it's making sure everybody's on the same page, whether or not we're getting the buy in that we need to from everybody within the organization. Those are things that you can approach right now.
“Overall, increasing your team speed, overall increasing your size at the lines of scrimmage, overall increasing your physicality at certain positions — like, I just can't fix those. Those are things over the long term where you see people that are built for success, they have these things and we're trying to get to those things. So, you know, how do find those solutions long term? There’s no waiver wire right now. … So we got what we got, and we gotta make it fit to what we need.”
Drinkwitz details clock management strategy
Along with Missouri’s run defense and Connor Bazelak’s overtime interception, Drinkwitz’s clock management at Boston College has been constantly broken down and second-guessed in the past few days. Tuesday, Drinkwitz explained the thought process that went into his timeout usage at the ends of both halves.
In the final minute of the first half, Drinkwitz could have called Missouri’s final timeout to stop the clock with around 50 seconds left prior to a Boston College field goal attempt, which would have given his offense a chance to score before the break. After the game, Boston College coach Jeff Hafley voiced his surprise that Drinkwitz didn’t take the opportunity.
Drinkwitz said he considered doing so, but he also recalled an instance last season when Missouri tried to score late in the first half while playing at Florida. Running back Tyler Badie fumbled, Florida recovered and scored a touchdown on the next play. In this instance, the Tigers would have gotten the ball with even less time remaining on the clock, so Drinkwitz opted to play it safe.
“I knew they started the second half with the football,” Drinkwitz explained. “And so, you know, one of the lessons I learned last year was against Florida, it was 13-7, I tried to be really aggressive, we fumbled, they scored. Kind of got the game out of reach. So in that situation, on the road, you know, just wanted to make sure that the last play of that half was a play that, we either blocked the field goal, they made it or missed it, but we're going into halftime with a tie.”
In the fourth quarter, Drinkwitz used his first timeout to challenge the lack of a targeting call when Bazelak slid and appeared to get hit in the helmet. Missouri lost the challenge — not a shock since every play is supposed to be assessed for targeting by officials in the booth, regardless of whether or not targeting is called on the field. Drinkwitz clarified that he called timeout because the play clock was winding down and he wanted to avoid a delay of game penalty that would have turned a third down and nine into a third and 14. While the clock was stopped, he figured he might as well ask the officials to look for targeting.
Missouri converted the third down and ultimately scored on the drive to take a four-point lead. Boston College proceeded to answer with a long drive that both drained the game clock and put its offense in scoring position. Drinkwitz said he wanted to wait until fewer than 40 seconds remained before using his timeouts. He was more concerned about not helping the Eagle offense with a clock stoppage than making sure his own offense had time to answer if Boston College found the end zone. He noted that he employed the same strategy against LSU last season, when Missouri’s goal line stand was successful.
In this case, the Tiger defense couldn’t come up with a stop, but Missouri still tied the game thanks to Harrison Mevis’ 56-yard field goal as time expired in regulation. The fact that Drinkwitz kept one timeout in his pocket for the drive made the kick possible.
“I was thinking, they had three timeouts,” Drinkwitz said. “Like, once we got the stop, right, I'm still, we're up by four. Once we get the stop, I got to make sure that I can either knee it out or do what I need to do. So once the clock got under 40 seconds and they've already used one of their timeouts, then the ballgame was decided by us, what we wanted to do with timeouts. You know, it was first and goal I think maybe at the 10, and then they got four yards, so a second goal, maybe at the six. And at that point, you know, last year against LSU, like, it's hey, we're playing this thing out. However it plays out, it plays out. But I didn’t want to keep letting them make decisions.”
While Drinkwitz referenced situations his team encountered last season to justify both decisions, he said there’s more that goes into the game-management process than that. He approaches those situations with a mix of pre-determined strategy and gut feel based on the game.
“That’s part of how you process it all,” he said, referring to past games. “I mean, every game really has a life of its own, but the challenges are different. I think if you have learned experiences, it can kind of factor into it, but I think each game you’ve got to kind of figure out how that game is being played. I do think our offense had a lot of confidence to go kick that field goal because they've done that before, but I wasn't sitting there thinking, oh, this is just like LSU.”
Cooper still recovering from foot injury
A few hours after Missouri’s loss at Boston College, redshirt freshman wide receiver Mookie Cooper took to social media to voice his displeasure with his involvement in the game. The Ohio State transfer played just 11 snaps and touched the ball one time during the game, a jet sweep that went for three yards. He posted on Instagram “would love to play some WR.”
Asked about Cooper’s involvement Tuesday, Drinkwitz indicated that Cooper is not yet back to full speed after suffering a foot injury during fall camp. Cooper didn’t appear to participate in practice Tuesday, as he was spotted wearing shorts and a t-shirt rather than pads.
Drinkwitz also said he has done Cooper a “disservice” by trying to strike a balance between letting him recover and still trying to scheme up ways to get him involved in the offense.
“I think we’ve done him a disservice because we've tried to — we got him back, but then we limited his role, and then we got him back, but he's still a little bit dinged,” Drinkwitz said. “And so we're working with the doctors on what's the best approach so that he can feel comfortable and confident to just go out there and play. And it’s not, you know, he gets these five plays and that's his role this week, and then he goes out there and he touches it on the first play and it's like, I'm not really full speed to do that. So we’ve just got to work with him, and I’ve got to trust him on where he’s at, if he’s not right.”
Through his first four games at Missouri, Cooper has totaled 111 yards on 16 touches. The majority of those have come on runs or short passes designed to get him the ball around the line of scrimmage, although he showed an ability to get behind the defense when he made a 46-yard catch against Southeast Missouri.
“I want it so bad for him, that I’m like, okay, well, if you’re not there, I’ll still get you these, these and these,” Drinkwitz explained. “I think I’ve set him back.”
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