For the second time in seven seasons, an 11-win Missouri team will head to the AT&T Cotton Bowl. Following a loss in the 2007 Big 12 Championship Game, Mizzou beat Southeastern Conference foe Arkansas. This time, the shoe is on the other foot. The Tigers lost the SEC Championship Game to Auburn on Saturday and now look to take down Big 12 rep Oklahoma State.

"I haven't really thought too much of it," said senior safety Matt White. "But I think I read a stat that the SEC has every Cotton Bowl game for the past ten years except for when Mizzou was in the Big 12, so hopefully we can keep that streak going."

White's recall was accurate. The SEC has gone 9-1 since Texas beat LSU 35-20 in the 2003 Cotton Bowl. The lone win was Missouri's 38-7 pounding of Arkansas on New Year's Day, 2008. That 31-point margin of victory represents the most lopsided Cotton Bowl since 1996.

And, now, rather than trying to help the Big 12 make up ground, the Tigers hope to continue the trend of SEC dominance.

"I think you always do in bowl games," Gary Pinkel said. "When we were in the Big 12, at the end of bowl season, you always look at our record, you know, in the Big 12 as compared to the other leagues. I did that when I coached in the PAC-10...There's certainly a great deal of pride. You're not only playing for yourself. There's a lot of reasons why you're playing, but we represent the SEC."

Every league takes pride in its bowl record. But few project the public pride in the success of other conference teams like the SEC.


"I think down south fans kind of take sports a little bit more serious, especially football," L'Damian Washington said. "I grew up in SEC land in Louisiana and there's just something about football that kind of drives the people and something we look forward to on Saturdays and Sundays. Definitely a pride thing with the SEC."


"You do have a sense of pride playing in the SEC and going up against great teams like you do in the SEC," Evan Boehm said. "When you look back on the season and you went to an SEC Championship and you lost two games throughout the schedule that you have. But you can throw all that stuff out the window right now. You have a bowl game to look forward to and you have a great OSU team that we're getting ready to play."

Missouri was allotted 12,500 tickets by the Cotton Bowl.


"We expect a great deal of enthusiasm from our fanbase," Executive Associate Athletic Director Bryan Maggard said. "We've opened those up to TSF members and season ticket holders to date and have had a very solid response thus far. Tomorrow at noon, the tickets will go open to the public and we would expect selling our allotment out midweek or certainly by week's end."

Auburn and Alabama filled the SEC's two spots in the Bowl Championship Series. The Capital One Bowl had the next pick and chose 10-and-2 South Carolina. The Cotton and Outback Bowls work in conjunction for the next two choices. Maggard said he did not have specific insight to the negotiations between those two bowls, but the Cotton has chosen an SEC West team in 13 of the last 15 years (Tennessee has gone twice). The Outback has featured an SEC East team in 14 of those 15 years.


"The Cotton Bowl has been very interested in us for weeks," Maggard said.

Much of that has to do with Missouri's season, and with Oklahoma State's. Oklahoma State went 10-and-2 in the regular season, Missouri was 11-and-1, and both played games on Saturday that, had they won, would have wrapped up conference championships. The two teams are most certainly worthy. But the new league versus old league storyline almost certainly played a part in the Tigers heading to Dallas.

"I think it's a great matchup," Pinkel said. "Look at the two teams' records, the great years we've had. I don't know, there's a lot of great matchups, but I can't imagine any better than this one. I think it's great."

The Cotton Bowl will kick off at 7 p.m. Central time on January 3rd, 2014. Missouri will hold its first of 15 practices in preparation for the game next Monday.

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