Mizzou snapped a 7-game winning streak, its longest streak in the Cuonzo Martin era and longest since 2013-14, with its loss to No. 7 Tennessee on Wednesday night. Dec. 30 is the latest on the calendar Mizzou suffered its first loss in a season since Marcus Denmon and company led the 2011-12 team to a historic 30-5 campaign.
The Tigers head to Fayetteville for the 52nd all-time meeting between Arkansas and Mizzou. The Tigers have faced the Razorbacks more than any SEC opponent, meeting 36 times before Mizzou became an official member of the Southeastern Conference.
Mizzou has won three of the last five matchups with Arkansas, but the two squads tend to hold serve at home. Mizzou has won four straight in the series in Columbia and Arkansas has won six consecutive in Fayetteville. Mizzou is looking for its first win in Fayetteville since Jan. 28, 2014 and just its second win at Arkansas since 1991.
Junior Xavier Pinson has a knack for big performances vs. Arkansas, racking up 58 combined points in four career games against the Razorbacks, including 19.5 points and 6.5 rebounds per game in the two meetings last season.
During nonconference play, Mizzou knocked off both No. 21 Oregon and No. 6 Illinois, and had five wins over teams in KenPom's Top 125 (Liberty, Wichita State, Bradley). The last time a Mizzou team racked up at least two Top 25 wins & a true road victory during nonconference play came during the 2011-12 campaign.
Mizzou is one of 11 teams nationally with a pair of wins over ranked opponents already.
After its historic start, Mizzou checked in at No. 12 in the AP Top 25 poll on Dec. 28, its highest ranking since Jan. 7, 2013 (No. 10). When Mizzou cracked the Top 25 on Dec. 14, it marked the first time the Tigers had been ranked during the Martin era and the first time since the 2013-14 campaign. Mizzou was ranked as high as No. 7 during the 2012-13 campaign.
Before the loss to Tennessee, Mizzou had collected its 17th 7-0 start in program history. Mizzou finished December 5-1 and improved to 20-3 in December during the Cuonzo Martin era.
A key to Mizzou's early success has been experience. Martin's squad features one of the most experienced rosters in all of college basketball, returning 88.13 percent of its scoring from a season ago, which ranks third among all Power 5 conference teams, trailing only Texas and UCLA.
The returners are responsible for 99.4 percent of Mizzou's points through three games. Seven Tigers are averaging 16 minutes or more thru four games, with six contributing at least 6.5 points on the young season.
Mizzou's veteran squad has been good recently under Martin in bounce-back games, going 4-1 in its last five games coming off a loss.
With freshman center 7-foot-3 Jordan Wilmore joining the squad, Mizzou enters the season with an average height of 6-foot-6. That makes the Tigers the SEC's tallest team in 2020-21 and the ninth-tallest team nationally.
X-FACTOR
An electric playmaker, Xavier Pinson has averaged 17.4 points over his last 12 games while producing 10 double-figure scoring games in that span, four of which have been 20-point or better efforts after a 22-point outburst vs. No. 21 Oregon. Pinson erupted for 19 second-half points and finished with four rebounds and three dimes against the Ducks.
Pinson's 162 career assists rank fifth among active SEC players. He grabbed a season-high seven boards vs. Liberty and leads all Mizzou guards with 25 for the season.
Pinson's ability to attack the rim has led to a team-best 35 trips to the foul line, where he's made 80 percent of his attempts.
Pinson enters his third season on campus after withdrawing his name from the NBA Draft pool at the end of the summer. The athletic guard averaged 11.1 points, 2.8 assists and 2.8 boards in 24 minutes as a sophomore. He launched the season with 17 points on 7-of-12 shooting vs. Oral Roberts, to go along with four assists. He's reached the 17-point mark eight times in his last 14 games, with Mizzou going 7-1 in those contests.
To close the season in 2019-20, he scored 170 points in nine outings, including four 20+ point efforts, and at least 15 points in six of his final seven games. Mizzou closed the season 6-3 when Pinson was its leading scorer.
