Nine basketball seasons have passed since the Missouri Tigers joined the SEC. They were on a solid run having won 30 regular season games the season prior and landing a 2-seed in the NCAA tournament. The tournament was weirdly cancelled and Mizzou’s senior-laden roster graduated and Frank Haith was able to mostly reload.
Entering their inaugural season of SEC play in a position of strength, most of us thought they would be able to slide into a slightly lesser league and hold onto a position of relative power. The SEC had spent years in a cycle of disinvestment from basketball as any waking dollar was funneled into football and in a lot of cases baseball.