The word of the week in the Missouri football facility: “Responsibility.”

Mizzou head coach Eli Drinkwitz said it no fewer than 10 times during his weekly press conference Tuesday, three days after Missouri suffered its first loss of the season — and its first loss since Nov. 4, 2023 — on Saturday at Kyle Field, where Texas A&M dismantled Mizzou in a 41-10 beatdown.

Drinkwitz’s general message was that the team is taking Saturday on the chin; moving on with a greater sense of internal accountability.

The coach’s words for the team struck a similar tone.

“This week, I had a very clear and direct message with our team, and I want to say it again here to y'all,” the Missouri football coach said. “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.”

Drinkwitz shouldered the blame for, well … just about everything that went wrong in College Station, and that meant he shouldered the blame for quite a lot.

The Tigers go back on the road this weekend with a Saturday morning game in Amherst, Massachusetts, against UMass. The Minutemen aren’t expected to cause Mizzou too many problems, as the Tigers have opened up as four-touchdown favorites.

Before then, Drinkwitz said the coaches have identified problems in all three phases — offense, defense and special teams — but are trying not to “jerk the steering wheel too fast” over making incremental adjustments. Here is what some of those are:

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‘Offensive rhythm’ lacking for Missouri football

A first-half shutout, more backbreaking penalties, a run game that was essentially a non-factor and a pass game that, again, struggled to meet preseason hype. There were questions about Missouri’s offense entering Saturday, and the Tigers didn’t give many encouraging on-field answers.

Brady Cook is “fully healthy,” Drinkwitz said, adding that he has asked the quarterback. Cook was 13-of-31 passing for 186 yards against Texas A&M. He rushed for 11 yards on 11 carries, and getting the QB more involved in the run game could be more apparent as Mizzou moves on, Drinkwitz said.

But perhaps more concerning than all of the above: Cook took six sacks and, per PFF College, was pressured 25 times in 64 plays.

Drinkwitz said he wouldn’t point fingers and didn’t specifically feel concerned about either the right or left hand side of the line. He also said the pressures were a result of an inability to find an early offensive flow.

“When unable to get into a rhythm,” Drinkwitz said, “we were unable to run the football; we were unable to establish a back-and-forth game because of the way that we started. … We didn't start very good. Third downs contributed to them continually scoring and us not being able to answer that, which then allows them to pressure the quarterback because they don't have any fear for the run game. So, (I’m) not pointing fingers at anybody other than myself.”

Defensive scheme, execution both need work

While Texas A&M was hurrying and hounding Cook, Missouri’s defense was struggling to counter.

Schematically, it appeared as if the Tigers were caught off guard by Conner Weigman starting as they rarely sent pressure on a not-so-mobile QB. In the lead up to the game, Drinkwitz had said he expected dual-threat backup Marcel Reed to get the nod.

Reed entered the game in the fourth quarter, only after Weigman had torched the Tigers for 276 yards on 18-of-22 passing. Weigman faced pressure only seven times and took contact just twice.

While the Tigers struggled to pressure Weigman, the run defense was getting gutted, too. The Aggies rushed 36 times for 236 yards.

“I think we all take responsibility for the issues on Saturday, schematically and execution wise,” Drinkwitz said. … “Shouldn't have mattered who was playing the quarterback position. We should have been better.”

Effort, reaction not an issue, Drinkwitz says

Some post-game conversation circled around Luther Burden III's sideline demeanor, who was frequently targeted on the sideline by the ABC broadcast. That was the first time Drinkwitz said he’d heard of that, before delivering an in-depth defense of the star wide receiver.

“There's nobody on our team that's questioned Luther’s motivation, drive, determination to help us win,” Drinkwitz said. “I think everybody saw him compete for catches at the end of the game. I think we were all disappointed. I hope they didn't have a video of me on the sideline the entire game, because my facial expressions would have shown disappointment in our performance.”

Team-wide, Drinkwitz limited his critiques from Saturday’s defeat to execution and schematics.

“I didn't see anything on the film that told me we had a lack of effort,” the coach said. “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.”

This article originally appeared on Columbia Daily Tribune: What Missouri football coach Eli Drinkwitz said Tigers need to fix