Georgia's Kirby Smart: Missouri's Eli Drinkwitz Has 'Done A Tremendous Job'
The No. 14 Missouri Tigers have climbed throughout the college football ranks throughout their thrilling 7-1 campaign, but they have their toughest challenge of the season on Saturday against the top-ranked Georgia Bulldogs.
Missouri head coach Eli Drinkwitz has earned the praise of many in the college football community and Georgia head coach Kirby Smart is the most recent to commend him.
"Eli has done a tremendous job with this team," Smart said during Monday's press conference. "We thought they were really good last year when we went to play them, which proved to be true, and they've only gotten better."
The Tigers were one of the few teams to put up a fight against the back-to-back national champion Georgia Bulldogs last season, but lost 26-22 after two unanswered touchdowns in the fourth quarter. Smart explained how being down helped them the rest of the year.
"They made us question ourselves," Smart said. "We didn't play well until the fourth quarter and a lot of that had to do with them. It helped build the resiliency of our team."
Smart believes that Missouri "could be very easily undefeated" despite the back-and-forth loss against LSU. Nevertheless, Smart, who is riding a 25-game win streak, said that his team "needs to get prepared for a battle at home."
"They've got a quarterback with great skill and they match that with a tough and sound defense," Smart said. "That's the recipe for winning. Eli has accumulated that talent, whether it's through the portal or through high school, he's a talent evaluator and does a great job of getting guys to buy in."
Drinkwitz's excellent talent evaluation has mainly stemmed from what Smart calls a "very fertile recruiting ground."
"They've got some really good players in their state and Eli does a really good job of taking that circle in the five-hour radius," Smart said. "You have a great program to sell when you create environments like he did when we played them in their place. He's got a product to put out there and sell to kids to come play there."
