Eli Drinkwitz takes shot at Big Ten for weaker schedule, cites as reason for three straight titles

Missouri head coach Eli Drinkwitz didn’t mince any words when it came to taking a shot at the Big Ten for their recent success. Michigan, Ohio State and Indiana have won the last three national titles in college football and a team from the conference could do it again this year. But there’s more to it than that, per Drinkwitz. Don’t look at the strength of schedule, as Drinkwitz claims. That’s the biggest reason why Big Ten teams were set up for success in the postseason. $19.99 gets you a FULL year of On3 | Rivals national coverage “When you don’t play a (non-conference) A4 game,” Drinkwitz said, via On3’s Brett McMurphy. To be fair to Drinkwitz, their three non-conference games were Old Dominion, Kennesaw State and Indiana State. So none from the power conference. But in the CFP, Indiana got a bye after beating Ohio State in the Big Ten Championship. They then proceeded to beat Alabama 38-3, Oregon 56-22 and Miami 27-21 to win the title. Eli Drinkwitz takes shot at Big Ten schedule Ohio State’s 2024 season was one to remember, considering they were in a similar boat as Indiana when it came to non-conference opponents. But, they beat Tennessee, Oregon, Texas and Notre Dame to win the title, via the CFP. As you can see, two of those squads came from the SEC. Plus, Michigan also beat Nick Saban and Alabama in the CFP semifinals en route to their national title victory ujnder Jim Harbaugh. So despite the scheduling complaints from Drinkwitz, the Big Ten champions have had the head-to-head success over the SEC as of late. Drinkwitz has been open and honest about scheduling, saying the SEC nine-game conference schedule for 2026 is going to be very challenging. Along the same lines, the playoff or bust mentality is not good for college football, per Coach Drink. He’s been supportive of an expanded CFP. “I talked about this at SEC Media Days, we gotta get out of this ‘Oh man, it’s playoffs or bust,’” Drinkwitz said last year. “Yes, again, we’re shooting for the moon, we’re going to put our whole self into that, but only 12 teams make the Playoffs and we put ourselves in position in November to be there. Didn’t get it done, I got that. But if the season only counts for 12 football teams, and we got a 127 D1 football teams, that math’s not gonna math very well. “Football is more than just the Playoff potential, and again, we were there, we didn’t get it done. But there’s a whole heck of a lot to be proud of, there’s a whole heck of a lot to play for,” Drinkwitz continued. “When I took over, we didn’t go to a bowl game, we (were under) NCAA probation, and ever since then, we’ve been going to bowl games. And there’s a lot of programs right now that would trade us spots. … So (we’ve) just got to keep on fighting, keep on believing, and we’re going to get ourselves back there. We’re going to bust through.”