Missouri coach Eli Drinkwitz held his weekly press conference with the media Tuesday as the team reflects on its first loss of the season and prepares to hit the road to UMass.

I picked a few of Drinkwitz’s quotes I thought were most telling.

I’ll start by saying the quote of the day was “We all take full responsibility for not playing to our full capabilities as a team and that starts with me.”

I don’t have a lot to add here, just figured it was worth mentioning that Drinkwitz said it multiple times and redirected multiple questions back to that answer. He refused to put blame on anyone but himself and how he prepared the team to play last Saturday.

What Drinkwitz said: “I had a very clear and direct message with our team, and I’m going to say it again here to y’all, one bad day doesn’t define our team or our season. Our response will. There’s going to be bad days you’re going to have. You know, you’re not always going to have peak performance as much as we would like to. It doesn’t have to define us, but we do have to respond and we do have to respond in a better manner and how we respond will define who we are as a team and what kind of character we have as a program.”

What was unsaid: The goals of the season are still attainable, they’re more difficult to reach, but they’re still attainable. If, as Drinkwitz likes to say he focuses on, the team goes “1-0 every week” the rest of the way, this is still a playoff team. The Tigers have been punched in the mouth a few times in their past few games. Falling behind against Boston College, needing double overtime to beat Vanderbilt and a no-show game last week. They responded well to the first two in the moment, if they are able to respond to the last one moving forward, then there is still a lot this team will be able to accomplish this season. And if that happens, maybe fans look back at the end of the season and say the A&M loss was what turned the team around after a sluggish start to the year. Good thing they have a struggling UMass team to start that turnaround against.

What Drinkwitz said: I haven’t seen anything, I’ve asked him. He’s fully healthy.

What was unsaid: Not a ton to dig into on this one, he was asked a direct question about how comfortable he was with Brady Cook’s health and whether everything was alright, and he gave a direct answer. Yes, he’s healthy.

So if you really want to dig something more out of that answer, it’s that Brady is staying in the game unless he’s unable to stand in the backfield. I understand the visuals from a few of his runs and a couple of his throws, but if there’s something wrong, either he’s not telling Drinkwitz or Drinkwitz isn’t telling us. Or he’s fine and a couple of weird-looking plays can’t give you the answer of how healthy someone is.

What Drinkwitz said: "I didn’t see anything on the film that told me we had a lack of effort. I’m keenly aware to look for that because that would tell me that there’s a deeper issue. We did not respond on either side of the ball with making the plays that we needed to, which, again, goes back to, did we put those guys in the right situations on offense or defense? Which is my responsibility, and we just weren’t able to land that counter punch. … We have to respond in a better manner. I think we all see that, recognize that, take responsibility for that.”

What was unsaid: Hey, there’s that taking responsibility quote again. I’ve counted it about five times as I’ve gone back through the quotes of a 20-minute press conference.

I’ve heard there were some pretty bad broadcast shots of the sideline from Saturday. I think what was unsaid here kind of goes along the lines of the quote of the day, Drinkwitz isn’t going to call out individuals for bad visuals or being upset during an upsetting game. He’s watching for what happens on the field and though the results were bad, nobody stopped caring about their performance between the lines. So any discussion of sideline visuals is going to stay in house as much as possible.

What Drinkwitz said: "I expect more competition from every position on our football team because at the end of the whole thing, No. 1 core value is always compete. And if we’re not playing at the level we want to play, then everybody else has got to compete. We have to compete as coaches in order to raise the level that we want to play at. … I thought Jalen Marshall came in in the third quarter and made a couple of really nice plays for us defensively, which helped us secure the run game. I think Nick Deloach and Toriano (Pride) have been doing a better job of rotating and competing and I think you’re going to see that more and more.”

What was unsaid: I can already see the response message to this in the thread being “Clearly not at every position if Brady is still at quarterback” and ya, you’re probably right. Brady Cook is the starting quarterback and will continue to be. But, fans should expect some more rotation or changes to the starting lineup moving forward. The coaches recognize that things need fixing and five games into the season maybe that fix isn’t just waiting on guys to figure it out. So, especially this week against UMass, I would expect to see a lot of bench or rotational guys getting more opportunities and the chance to win the job at their position.

Head on over to the Tiger Walk to discuss the press conference, this story and so much more.