Eli Drinkwitz puts Missouri’s Texas loss on himself while Missouri AD calls for officiating transparency

Missouri athletic director Laird Veatch has asked the SEC for a formal review of the officiating in the Missouri Tigers’ 34-20 loss to the Texas Longhorns at Faurot Field. Eli Drinkwitz used his weekly press conference Tuesday to give his players a different message to carry into Saturday’s trip to face the Georgia Bulldogs.

Missouri led 20-13 in the third quarter when an Arch Manning throw under pressure was ruled a fumble, keeping alive a Texas drive that ended in the tying touchdown. Texas scored the last 21 points of the game, and the SEC’s postgame statement said the ruling on the field was a fumble.

“The stakes for these games have never been higher. And with that comes the responsibility for getting things right. After the game Saturday, we requested a formal review and response from the SEC regarding the officiating. Consistent with SEC expectations, we will not make those conversations or responses public, other than that we have not received anything inconsistent with what the conference has already shared publicly,” Veatch said in a statement.

“The next opportunity, the next moment. I mean, if you feel sorry for yourselves in this league, Coach Smart always says humility is a week away. There’s an ass whoopin’ waiting on the other end if you don’t get your mind right. And as a competitor, as a competitor, you got to put your whole self into a game, and you got to bring your whole self back out of it. You got to get your ass up off the mat, and you can be disappointed, but you move on. I mean, it is what it is. There’s only going to be one winner and one loser in every contest, and the world doesn’t really measure how much effort you put in or didn’t put in. It just measures the results. So you got to move on, and there’s another opportunity for us. And I think the biggest thing is, you know, don’t give in to victimhood. Don’t give in to people making excuses for you or blaming somebody else. You look yourself in the mirror like I did and said I screwed that up Saturday. Bottom line, I did,” Drinkwitz said.

Eli Drinkwitz on moving on from disappointment:

“There’s an ass whoopin’ waiting on the other end if you don’t get your mind right.”

“You gotta get your ass off the mat.

“You can be disappointed, but you have to move on.” https://t.co/PtAf35N3zI

— SEC Mike (@MichaelWBratton) November 10, 2026

Drinkwitz borrowed a Kirby Smart line for Georgia week

The coach Drinkwitz cited is Kirby Smart, whose Georgia team hosts Missouri on Saturday. Drinkwitz took a line from the man on the other sideline this week and used it to tell his own players what a slow recovery from Texas would cost them in Smart’s stadium.

Missouri is 6-3 and 3-3 in the SEC, with home games against the Kentucky Wildcats on Nov. 21 and the Oklahoma Sooners on Nov. 28 still ahead. The last time the Tigers lost this season, 31-3 at the Ole Miss Rebels on Oct. 17, they came out of an open date and won 34-10 at the Arkansas Razorbacks. This time, the next game is in Athens, with no open date in between.

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