Sure, the grapes are bitter at present. Sure, the feelings are nonetheless uncooked. For those who’ve learn me in any respect, you understand how I really feel about even enjoying this sequence. I hated it since 5 seconds after it was introduced. It was a nasty concept then, and it is a dangerous concept now.
Missouri gained the sport. That is not what that is about.
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I do not significantly care that Missouri threw towards the top zone with 28 seconds left whereas main by 17. If Kansas does not need Missouri throwing the ball, cease them. We definitely have not spent the final century worrying about Missouri’s emotions whereas burying them in each different sport, nor ought to we. Regardless of what Eli Drinkwitz apparently thinks, rivalry video games will not be group remedy. And the postgame press convention shouldn’t be the place to lecture Kansas followers about what this rivalry is about.
Drinkwitz was upset by the video Kansas launched earlier than the sport, which leaned closely into the precise historical past behind the Kansas-Missouri rivalry: Bleeding Kansas, John Brown, William Quantrill, and the violence alongside the border earlier than and throughout the Civil Conflict.
Refined? No.
Provocative? Clearly.
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After the sport, Drinkwitz had this to say:
“I am simply glad that this complete right-versus-wrong bullcrap that was began simply bought settled … It is a soccer recreation. It is an American soccer recreation. Folks love to come back watch and cheer for his or her groups. It is not even deeper than that. And I get there is a previous for it, however why are we stirring that bullcrap up? It is 9/11. This nation wants unity now greater than ever. And I used to be embarrassed for them, to be trustworthy. That is why I attempted to embarrass them on the finish.”
Let’s be clear right here. He mentioned that Kansas had turned the rivalry into one thing it should not be. He questioned why KU was “stirring that bullcrap up,” insisted that this was about two groups enjoying soccer and wasn’t any deeper than that, invoked the twenty fifth anniversary of September 11 as a motive Individuals must be emphasizing unity, and mentioned the video was a part of the explanation he needed to embarrass Kansas on the finish.
You recognize what? Nice. If Eli Drinkwitz desires to argue that Kansas went too far with the video, he could make that argument. However spare me the remainder of it.
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Sure, Missouri embarrassed Kansas on the scoreboard.
Drinkwitz embarrassed himself afterward.
Kansas and Missouri have each spent a long time leaning into the historical past, hatred, and mythology of this rivalry. No person out of the blue found Friday night time that the Border Conflict has roots deeper than soccer. The embarrassing half is appearing shocked by it now.
Missouri has been completely glad to name this “warfare,” to speak about its Civil Conflict roots, to show its gamers about 1854, and to declare that “The Border Conflict by no means dies.” However Kansas makes the historical past express, and out of the blue we’re presupposed to fake that is simply two groups enjoying soccer? Come on.
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Nationwide protection has largely handled Drinkwitz and Missouri’s response as a part of the leisure; ESPN apparently thinks they’re hilarious. In the meantime, native protection is already asking whether or not Kansas followers wish to hold the rivalry going. Nice, I assume. I had a distinct query, although: Does something Eli Drinkwitz mentioned final night time sq. with what he and Missouri have been saying about this rivalry for years?
KUSports no less than observed how unusual the entire controversy was. However no one appears significantly considering checking whether or not Drinkwitz’s lecture survives contact together with his personal report.
What I came upon was that apparently Eli Drinkwitz has by no means met Eli Drinkwitz.
Seems, there are many receipts.
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Final summer time, as Missouri ready to play Kansas for the primary time since voluntarily leaving the Large 12, Drinkwitz was requested concerning the rivalry at SEC Media Days. He defined the Civil Conflict-era origins of Missouri’s Tiger nickname, known as the rivalry “very deep,” and mentioned his gamers understood its historic implications and significance to the state.
Then, throughout an look on SEC This Morning, Drinkwitz reportedly made issues significantly clearer: “This factor goes again to the Civil Conflict. Folks died on this rivalry.”
Huh.
However Drinkwitz did not cease there.
Earlier than final 12 months’s recreation, he mentioned Missouri had mentioned its historic significance and context. He introduced in audio system to teach his gamers concerning the rivalry. “We have embraced it, we perceive it, we have taught about it.” At one level, Drinkwitz even referenced bringing somebody in to inform the staff about 1854.
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For many who slept via American historical past, 1854 was not the 12 months Kansas and Missouri first performed soccer. What did occur in 1854 was passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act, which opened the query of whether or not Kansas would enter the Union as a free or slave state and helped ignite what grew to become Bleeding Kansas.
So Missouri’s soccer program was fairly actually instructing its gamers concerning the pre-football origins of the battle.
However please, Kansas. Why are you stirring up all that previous bullcrap?
That is hardly restricted to Drinkwitz. Missouri’s official soccer recreation notes for the 2025 Kansas recreation launched the matchup beneath a pleasant, understated headline: THIS IS WAR. Apparently, Strategic Communications missed the “it is only a soccer recreation” assembly.
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And Missouri Athletics has been doing this for years! Earlier than the 2022 basketball recreation in Columbia, an official Mizzou Hoops hype video narrated by DeMarre Carroll declared: “This recreation is warfare, them versus us.”
Earlier than the 2023 recreation, one other official Mizzou Hoops video instructed viewers: “Let the warfare start.”
In 2024, Missouri’s official basketball preview introduced: “The Border Conflict is again at Mizzou Enviornment.”
After which got here December 2025. 9 months in the past, Mizzou Athletics launched an official hype video for the Kansas basketball recreation.
Not a fan account.
Not Tigerboard.
Not some random fool screaming into the void (me).
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The precise, formally sanctioned College of Missouri “Mizzou Athletics” account.
It opened this fashion: “This is not only a rivalry. That is the Border Conflict.” The video described “a rivalry that spans over 100 years, with the hatred older than the hardwood.” Then: “It is not simply one other recreation.” And eventually: “The Border Conflict by no means dies. And the subsequent chapter begins now.”
However but, 9 months later, Eli Drinkwitz would love everybody to know that Kansas-Missouri is simply two groups enjoying soccer and we should not make it any deeper than that.
Missouri has actually spent years advertising this rivalry by saying the precise reverse. Hell, return to 2011. Missouri’s personal athletic division defined that what separated Kansas-Missouri from odd geographic rivalries was that this one was “rooted in precise warfare, the Civil Conflict.”
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Their phrases!!!
Missouri has spent a long time promoting the historical past when the historical past made the rivalry appear cooler, meaner, older, and extra essential. Now Kansas talks about what that historical past really was, and out of the blue everybody must clutch their pearls?
Bleeding Kansas was, at its core, a battle over whether or not slavery can be allowed to develop into Kansas. Professional-slavery Missourians crossed the border to affect that consequence. Quantrill later led Accomplice guerrillas into Lawrence and massacred civilians. Missouri followers are welcome so as to add all of the historic nuance they need. There may be loads so as to add. None of it adjustments these details.
And if Missouri does not like the way in which it seems to be when Kansas places that historical past right into a 90-second hype video? That isn’t a Kansas downside. You do not get to spend a long time celebrating the truth that this rivalry grew out of precise warfare after which demand everybody cease discussing what the warfare was about as a result of that half makes you uncomfortable. (That is the Good vs. Evil half, in case it wasn’t apparent.)
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I believe Missouri loves the hatred. I believe Missouri loves the Border Conflict. I believe Missouri even loves the historical past. They only apparently favor it when no one asks what the historical past was really about.
Then there’s Drinkwitz invoking September 11.
I’ve no objection in any way to treating September 11 with solemnity, and I perceive the purpose about nationwide unity on the twenty fifth anniversary. However there’s something unbelievable about invoking a historic occasion from 25 years in the past to make an ethical level concerning the current whereas concurrently complaining that Kansas invoked historic occasions from 170 years in the past to make an ethical level concerning the current.
One is remembering historical past. The opposite is “stirring bullcrap up.”
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Make it make sense.
After which, after lecturing Kansas about violent historic imagery, stirring up the previous, and nationwide unity, Drinkwitz later added this gem: “We left Kansas bleeding once more.”
However Kansas should not reference Bleeding Kansas as a result of the topic is just too divisive and that is solely soccer.
Acquired it.
Look, Eli Drinkwitz can hate the Kansas video. Missouri followers can hate the Kansas video. They will name it tasteless, oversimplified, inflammatory, traditionally incomplete, or simply silly. I genuinely don’t care. However Missouri DOES NOT get to spend years promoting the Border Conflict as one thing deeper than sports activities after which act scandalized when Kansas factors out why there was a Border Conflict within the first place.
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Not after “THIS IS WAR.”
Not after “This recreation is warfare.”
Not after “Let the warfare start.”
Not after “the hatred older than the hardwood.”
Not after “The Border Conflict by no means dies.”
And positively not after Eli Drinkwitz himself instructed America that folks died on this rivalry, known as its historical past “very deep,” and made positive his personal gamers discovered about 1854.
You may’t have it each methods. Both it is simply one other soccer recreation, or the historical past issues.
Missouri has spent an terrible lot of time telling us it issues.
They only did not just like the historical past lesson Kansas gave them.
