Missouri's win over UCF isn't pretty, but the Tigers will take it

It wasn't pretty, but the Missouri Tigers will take it. They obviously have no other choice.

Still to walk away from the road game with Central Florida with a win in any they can get one is what really matters, and the Tigers now stand again with a winning record in a season where every win will count. That's because every win will be analyzed again and again.

The entire country will be interested in how the first season will go for both the Texas A&M Aggies and Missouri Tigers as they adjust to the SEC to see how they rank to their new contemporaries. So far in Missouri's case, the evidence is not good. However, that's not a fair assessment if you take the level of competition into play. After all the team has lost twice in the SEC to Georgia and South Carolina and both teams are ranked No. 5 and 6 in the country.

Still that's the name of the game in the current SEC. While they have faced those two top teams, Missouri still hasn't faced Alabama and LSU so it's not as if the Tigers can claim that they've already played the best of the new conference. It's a scary proposition, but it shows that the Tigers have a ways to go.

However it doesn't mean that they are suddenly the new bottom feeders either. The SEC has a wide variety of talent levels, unlike the Big 12 where it's all competitive minus the Kansas Jayhawks. That means that Missouri can definitely turn around their fortunes but they will have to claw for their wins any way they can get them in a meaningful season under the microscope like this one.