Erik Link | University of Missouri

A 15+-year coaching veteran, Erik Link joined the Mizzou staff in December, 2019 as Special Teams Coordinator. He added tight ends coach to his title in January 2022.

In 2021, kicker Harrison Mevis was named to multiple All-America teams and was first-team All-SEC selection by the league’s coaches. He hit a career-long 56-yard boot to send the game to overtime at Boston College. He was 3-for-3 on the season and is 6-for-7 in his career from beyond 50 yards. Mevis was 20-of-22 in field goals, including 11-of-13 from 40-49.

In 2020, Mevis was named to The Athletic's Freshman All-America Team and to the league coaches’ All-SEC Freshman Team. He was successful on 17-of-20 field goals for the Tigers and a perfect 28-of-28 on PATs. He connected on 3-of-4 kicks from 50+ yards and his 52-yard field goal vs. LSU (Oct. 10) was the longest by a Mizzou freshman in program history.

Mevis matched a school record for a kicker with five field goals against Arkansas (Dec. 5), the most by any kicker nationally, and reset the school's record of scoring by a kicker with 20 of Mizzou's 50 points in a 50-48 win over the Razorbacks. Included in those five field goals was a walk-off, game-winning 32-yarder to send Mizzou to its fifth straight win over Arkansas and netted Mevis SEC Special Teams Player of the Week honors.

Link’s App State special teams units proved to be among the nation's best in 2019, playing a crucial role in the 20th-ranked Mountaineers' 12-1 season that culminated with a Sun Belt Championship Game victory.

Under Link's guidance, Appalachian State ranked in the nation's top 30 in numerous special teams categories, including a national-best seven blocked kicks (five kicks/two punts), without allowing a single blocked kick or punt. The 2019 Mountaineers also ranked in the following special teams categories: punt return coverage (15th NCAA/1st Sun Belt – 3.65 avg.), kickoff returns (16th NCAA/1st Sun Belt – 24.4 avg.) and kickoff return coverage (28th NCAA/3rd Sun Belt – 18.91 avg.).

Additionally, Link's punting and punt return units weren't far off those lofty standards, as App State finished the 2019 season ranked 34th nationally (third in the Sun Belt) in net punting (39.69 avg.) and 41st nationally (fourth in the Sun Belt) in punt returns (9.82 avg.).

Mizzou is the third school at which Link and Drinkwitz have coached together. Their first pairing came as quality control assistants on an Auburn staff that helped the Tigers win a 2010 national title with a 14-0 record. Link later contributed to another BCS Championship Game appearance as a special teams/offensive analyst with Auburn in 2013. In those two SEC title seasons, plus a stint as Montana State's special teams coordinator and tight ends coach from 2011-12, Link was part of four consecutive conference championships.

Prior to App State, Link spent the 2018 season as the special teams coordinator for Louisiana Tech, which won the SoFi Hawaii Bowl to cap an eight-win season in which the Bulldogs blocked four kicks to rank 10th nationally.

He spent two seasons back in his hometown of Des Moines, Iowa, as the head coach and assistant athletics director at Roosevelt High School, which went winless the season before his 2016 arrival but won the 2017 city championship. 

Montana State reached the FCS quarterfinals in 2011 and 2012, while Auburn followed its BCS title game appearance in 2013 with an Outback Bowl appearance in 2014 and a Birmingham Bowl win in 2015.

From 2006-08, Link was a member of Iowa State's staff in a variety of roles, including offensive line graduate assistant (2006), assistant director of football operations (2007-08) and director of high school relations (2007-08). Following his time with the Cyclones, Link was a teacher and coach at Texas' Keller High School in 2009.

Link began his collegiate coaching career in 2004 as a defensive graduate assistant at Drake. In 2005, Link moved into the role of defensive line coach for Drake a year before joining the Iowa State staff. Link made his coaching debut at North High School in Des Moines in 2003, when he served as an assistant coach on the offensive line.

Link is a 2003 Drake graduate with a bachelor's degree in secondary education. He was a member of the Bulldogs’ offensive line from 1999-2002 and helped lead them to the 2000 Pioneer Football League Championship while earning a spot on the Athletic Director's Honor Roll four-straight years. He earned his master's degree in public administration in executive leadership from Drake in 2008.

Link and his wife, Jill, have one daughter, Evelyn.