No, Missouri’s football team has not embraced 1990s rock staple Stone Temple Pilots. But STP has grown into the unofficial acronym that’s defined the Tigers’ 2023 season: Something To Prove.
The Tigers’ coach, Eli Drinkwitz, hadn’t secured a winning season in his first three campaigns, despite a parade of wins on the recruiting trail and in the transfer portal. Those wins improved the Tigers from 50th in the 247Sports Team Talent Composite in 2020 to 25th this season, one spot ahead of undefeated Washington.
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Missouri’s quarterback, Brady Cook, had to re-win his job in preseason camp. When Cook was introduced for the Tigers’ third game this year, home fans serenaded him with boos.
Missouri’s running back, Cody Schrader, transferred from Truman State before the 2022 season as the leading rusher in Division II. Drinkwitz let Schrader walk on but had “no intention of him ever playing.”
And in the preseason, the Tigers were picked to finish sixth in the SEC East, ahead of only Vanderbilt.
Something to prove? There’s a lot of that going around Columbia this fall.
But Mizzou isn’t concerned about proving itself to skeptics or boo birds. The proof? That’s for one another.
“Not to the doubters,” Drinkwitz said, “but to each other that we’re worth the price of hard work and dedication to the team.”
So far?
The Tigers are 7-1, guaranteeing Drinkwitz’s first winning season in Columbia. But with a trip to Georgia on tap for Saturday, there is plenty more on the table for the Tigers in 2023.
“This season’s been special. It’s been what has kept this team working so hard for the last three years. This is why we do it. This is why we stayed,” Cook said. “We’re seeing the success we can have.”
Cook? On the same day he was booed during team introductions, he threw for 356 yards and two touchdowns, adding a score on the ground in a 30-27 win over Kansas State, punctuated by a 61-yard, game-winning kick from Harrison Mevis as time expired.
“This university needed that game, coach Drink needed that game, I needed it, we all did,” Cook said. “It was a storybook ending.”
Missouri upsets No. 15 Kansas State on a 61-yard FG, 30-27 🔥
Harrison Mevis walks it off for @MizzouFootball.
🎥 @SECpic.twitter.com/M0U87wco3d
— The Athletic (@TheAthletic) September 16, 2023
After the game, Drinkwitz furiously defended his quarterback.
“It pissed me off when we booed our starting quarterback to start the game,” Drinkwitz said. “He went out and played his butt off for this university and this team. They need to get behind him. You get behind the young man. You want to boo me? Fine. You don’t boo the starting quarterback. It’s bullcrap.”
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Why call out the fans?
“My job is to love and support my players, the guys that lay it on the line for me and this university. When you’re in charge, there’s times you gotta love ’em up, times you have to discipline, and there’s times you gotta defend them,” Drinkwitz said. “We’ve been criticized before, and there’s times it’s deserved, and you have to own that. And then there’s times it’s being piled on. At that point, after the way he played and me knowing that he played through such a tough injury and performed so valiantly against Kansas State, it was time to let everybody know that enough’s enough.”
Cook said he gained a lot of respect for Drinkwitz because of his full-throated postgame defense.
Said Schrader: “That’s just who he is. He loves us and this program. He’s as real as it gets, even with his corny jokes. He wants to be more than a football coach and affect our lives outside of the game. We saw that when he protected Brady and stood up for him. It’s not just Brady, he would do that for anybody on this team and when your coach will put himself on the line for a player, guys can buy into that and ride with him.”
And unlike some, Drinkwitz was all too aware of what his quarterback had faced a season ago as a first-year starter. Cook grew up a Missouri fan and got his GED so he could enroll early in 2020 and jump-start his career at his dream school.
But in his second game as a starter in 2022, he tore his rotator cuff. Doctors said Cook would need surgery at some point. If he kept playing, it would be painful and difficult and might mean a more intensive surgery after the season. Cook chose to keep playing. He had never had a sports-related surgery before, and playing through pain was new for him, too.
“This is what I always wanted. I’m going to make sure to do everything I can to finish out this season. I’m not going to let the injury take this away from me,” Cook said.
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The team kept his injury quiet, but teammates noticed how much he was struggling in practice and wincing when he threw. A month or so after the injury, Drinkwitz informed the team about Cook’s injury and his decision.
“Practice and during the week was the most brutal,” Cook said. “Every throw, there’s a pretty intense pinch, and it feels like you’re throwing with an unstable shoulder. It’s not ideal. It fatigued very quickly. By the second half of games, it started to really wear down and you’d feel it more. It was tough, but I’m glad it’s all fixed up now.”
Cook missed spring practice after offseason surgery and had to win his job back in preseason camp from four-star freshman Sam Horn and incoming transfer Jake Garcia from Miami. Going into Missouri’s season opener, Drinkwitz declined to name a starter. But Cook has seized the job and thrived with a healthy shoulder.
“I owe him a debt of, ‘Hey man, I should have believed in you quicker,'” Drinkwitz said. “But the thing that stands out is how he’s handled it with such class. He never lost belief in himself. He never gave up on his process. The guy wants to lay it on the line for his teammates and the people of Missouri and you see that all the time.”
He’s 11th nationally in passer rating (166.22) this season and 12th in yards per attempt (9.3), fueling a resurgent Missouri offense. Playing with the injury last year, Cook ranked 71st in passer rating and 70th in yards per attempt.
The Tigers’ offense has jumped from 87th in yards per play last season to 17th this year.
“It means everything. The energy around this program and in our building is different,” Cook said. “The start we’ve had means a lot to this state, this fan base and us too.”
Leading receiver Dominic Lovett transferred to Georgia, but the Tigers added Theo Wease, a top-40 prospect in the Class of 2019 who caught 19 passes for 378 yards and four touchdowns at Oklahoma last season. An SEC coach said last month that he believed Wease was an upgrade from Lovett. Wease has caught 36 passes for 440 yards and five touchdowns in eight games this year, but his arrival has meant more than just production.
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Luther Burden III, the nation’s No. 2 receiver in the 2022 class, has caught 61 passes for 905 yards and six scores this year. Only four receivers have more receiving yards.
“It starts with Theo’s maturity and the presence he has in our room. He’s been through the fires and he was a big recruit himself so he helps manage expectations and the hoopla around Luther. But him being able to play (outside) allows Luther to play in the slot and do what he does best, get yards after catch. That’s what makes him such an elite player,” Drinkwitz said. “Having Theo and (Ohio State transfer) Mookie Cooper on the outside has really given him a lot of freedom on the interior.”
In the running game, Schrader doesn’t have the recruiting credentials of the Tigers’ receivers, but his production has been in line with players who do. The Truman State transfer is second in the SEC with 807 yards and nine scores, but no other back in the SEC has four 100-yard games this year.
“It’s been life-changing. It’s something I’ll carry on and hopefully pass on to my family one day,” Schrader said. “It shapes your life when you’re bought in and you really love this stuff.
Just like Cook, Burden and Drinkwitz, he had plenty to prove, too. A booster alerted Drinkwitz to Schrader’s intentions to join the program after the 2021 season, and Drinkwitz welcomed him as a walk-on. He didn’t take his hopes of playing seriously initially, but Schrader’s work during practice made him impossible to ignore. Now, he’s reaping the benefits.
“It was a no-brainer to go and bet on myself and take that chance. It was a dream of mine out of high school, and I wasn’t recruited by Mizzou. Internally I had something to prove and I was going to show the world that they should have bet on me coming out of high school,” Schrader said. “I heard through the grapevine of a lot of people questioning my decision. Who would have thought a DII kid could come to the SEC and do what I’ve been able to do? But I bet on myself and always will. It’s in the work. At Division II, that was my SEC, that was my NFL. That was the mindset I’ve always had, no matter where I am I’m going to work as hard as I can and be the best version of myself.”
Schrader has played through injury as well. He has dealt with a bruised and strained quad muscle for weeks and after Missouri’s win over South Carolina, needed 60 ccs of blood drained from the muscle.
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“All he’s done is rip off touchdowns in every game,” Drinkwitz said. “It’s been remarkable.”
It has paid off, and Missouri is well-positioned to have its best season since winning the SEC East in 2013 and 2014 under Gary Pinkel, the program’s second and third seasons in the conference.
“It’s awesome. My whole career we were 6-6, 5-7 in the middle of the pack,” defensive lineman Darius Robinson said. “From the jump, people told us we weren’t going to be that good or this or that. We just cared about each other. We have a mindset that it’s just us. We’re on an island by ourselves, fighting as a team. … This team is legit, man.”
The Tigers have played their way into sole possession of second place in the SEC East behind undefeated, two-time defending national champion Georgia.
“I think we’re pretty gritty. We have a stubborn refusal to quit,” said Drinkwitz, whose team has been tied or trailed in the second half of three wins. “We’re emotionally consistent, and I think we have a lot of good energy.”
After Georgia, home games against Tennessee and Florida await before finishing with a road trip to face Arkansas with the Battle Line Trophy at stake, which Mizzou has won six of the past seven seasons.
Athens will serve as a proving ground for the opportunity to secure the biggest win for Missouri in a decade. But win or lose, the breakthrough season has proven plenty.
Often, Drinkwitz reminds his players to take a moment while they’re running out of the tunnel for games. Look up. Look around. Smile. Take in the opportunity they have. There are only so many in life. And this year, they’ve taken advantage of more opportunities than Mizzou has since Pinkel left the program after a cancer diagnosis in 2015.
“We’re hungry. Everybody on this team has something to prove,” Schrader said. “For a long time, Mizzou has been looked down upon or questioned why we’re in the SEC and people are taking it personally this year. Every game is personal because of the season we had last year. We love to win and that’s what we’re chasing.”
(Top photo of Brady Cook: Michael Hickey / Getty Images)