Eli Drinkwitz Has Borrowed Kirby’s Sermon
Written by Jarvis Prime on November 10, 2026
Evening Edition — filed after the afternoon news cycle.
GEORGIA MONEYBALL — Tuesday, November 10, 2026
Missouri's coach took the blame for the Texas loss, quoted the Georgia coach's favorite line, and now brings a team that has lost ten straight to the Bulldogs into Athens on Saturday.
ALBANY, GA — · By the RFA Sports Desk
Eli Drinkwitz stood up after Texas beat Missouri 34-20 on Saturday and told anybody listening that his Tigers are not victims, that he refuses to give in to a victim mentality, and that the loss belonged to him. Then he reached across the league and borrowed a line. Humility, he said, is a week away. That is Kirby Smart's line. Kirby used it in Oxford on Saturday night, and now the fellow bringing a team to Athens this weekend is preaching from the same hymnal. The Columbia Daily Tribune carried the sermon. Imitation being the sincerest form of flattery, Georgia ought to feel flattered.
The friendship is genuine. Smart told reporters Monday that he has a lot of respect for Drinkwitz, that he is one of his close friends, and that he thinks he is one of the best coaches in the country. Fine words between friends. The ledger between their teams is less tender. Georgia's athletic department says the Bulldogs lead the series twelve to one and are eight and oh against Missouri under Smart, and the Tigers have dropped ten in a row to Georgia. Drinkwitz called Georgia the benchmark for the league right now. He would know. Nobody has had a longer look at the yardstick.
Now the fellow bringing a team to Athens this weekend is preaching from the same hymnal.
The lone Missouri win, oddly enough, came in Sanford Stadium, 41 to 26 in 2013, the sort of fact Georgia people file away and Missouri people frame. Everything since has gone the other way, and the market does not expect a change of scenery. DraftKings has Georgia by 13 and a half with a total of 47 and a half. Bet365 makes it 14 and a half, the largest spread Missouri has faced all season, and the desk's own opponent-adjusted rating says Georgia by about 15 in Athens. The Tigers are unranked for the first time this year. Nobody in Columbia is claiming to be a victim, mind you.
Drinkwitz is not arriving with a hat and a prayer, either. Smart told reporters Monday that Missouri has got an elite quarterback, and SicEmDawgs reported he went so far as to liken Austin Simmons to an elite pitcher. The numbers hold up: 2,204 yards, 18 touchdowns and two interceptions, which is a man who does not hand you the football. Jamal Roberts has run for 1,071 yards, a thousand-yard back nine games in. Drinkwitz told reporters that receiver Cayden Lee, who limped out of the Texas game, has no structural knee damage and that nothing would shock him more than Lee missing Athens. Missouri's official availability report lands Wednesday night.
If anybody is limping into this one, it is the favorite. Smart said after the Ole Miss game that Georgia is beat up and banged up, and so is everybody else in the league. DawgNation reported that Monday's injury list ran to cornerback Ellis Robinson, receivers Craig Dandridge and Thomas Blackshear, defensive tackle Josh Horton, running back Chauncey Bowens and defensive back Tyriq Green, with outside linebacker Amaris Williams out with a knee, and that Smart described his receiver room as dinged up across the board. Lineman Dontrell Glover put the week's assignment plainer than any coach on Monday. You can't chill, he said. You have got to always be on ten in the SEC.
Kickoff is 3:30 Saturday on ABC, Georgia's last home conference game of the year, under a clear sky with the afternoon around 50 degrees. SicEmDawgs reported Smart said the ranking means nothing and the weekly schedule will not change for the new No. 1. Good. The last time Georgia came home from a big road win at Alabama, it lost to Auburn in this very building, which is what humility a week away actually looks like. Two friends will shake hands at midfield, and then one of them will spend three hours trying to make the other one humble.
The Notebook
- THE ONE EVERYBODY'S ARGUING ABOUT: Notre Dame 31, Miami 24 in South Bend. Elija Lofton's apparent fourth-down touchdown catch with 3:36 left was ruled incomplete, Mario Cristobal said he was beyond upset, and Utah and UCLA are the only unbeatens left. Oregon also went into Columbus and beat Ohio State 41-28. The playoff committee's new rankings come out Tuesday night.
- HARDWARE WATCH: Georgia's athletic department said Tuesday that Gunner Stockton is a Maxwell Award semifinalist and Chris Cole and KJ Bolden are Bednarik semifinalists. Earnest Greene III was named Outland Trophy National Player of the Week for his work in Oxford.
- COUNTDOWN: Four days to Missouri, 3:30 Saturday on ABC at Sanford Stadium. DraftKings has Georgia by 13.5 with a total of 47.5, and the Nov. 21 trip to South Carolina is now set for 7:30 on ABC.
Written in the tradition of Lewis Grizzard, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 1946–1994.
Hear the desk read tonights report on Radio Free Albany, WPFQ 96.7.
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