Mizzou Basketball

[Saul Good]

MIZ-ZOU

[KcMizzou]

Gottlieb's finally coming around on Mizzou.

GottliebShow Doug Gottlieb
there is a chance KU and MU get one seeds “@B_Roettger: @GottliebShow is it safe to assume the big 12 champ gets a #1 seed?”

GottliebShow Doug Gottlieb
Kentucky,Mizzou,Cuse,Ohio State in that order “@tychamp22: @GottliebShow who are your 4 number one seeds”

[|Zach|]

big 12 tourn is gonna be crazy if it shakes out right.

[O.city]

Gottlieb giving MU respect, putting them at number 2.


It would be crazy if they both got 1 seeds.

[Saul Good]

Originally Posted by |Zoccer|

big 12 tourn is gonna be crazy if it shakes out right.

Screw the tournament. Just line up Kansas and Mizzou for round three. Of course, if Mizzou wins at AFH, you can just cancel the whole thing for all I care.

[O.city]

Think you guys will win in Lawrence?


If Ku wins I think they should just cancel the tourney and have KU and MU play at the Sprint.

[Mosbonian]

Interesting.....if Baylor slides at home to ISU on Monday night, in one weeks span they go from fighting for 1st place to landing in 4th place.

[KcMizzou]

Originally Posted by O.city

Think you guys will win in Lawrence?

No idea. Hell, I was worried about today.

I'd be surprised if we did, but only mildly.

[KcMizzou]

COLUMBIA, Mo. -- They call it 10-for-14, a sort of masochistic shooting drill Marcus Denmon and Phil Pressey dreamed up in the preseason. The idea is simple: Make 10 out of 14 shots from seven spots on the floor.

The catch? If you don’t hit 10, start over.

Pressey rarely had to start over when the two Missouri guards got together for the preseason drill. Yet during games, Denmon often finds himself yelling at his point guard, practically begging him to shoot.

“Phil is just naturally a pass-first player,’’ Denmon said. “I’m always telling him to shoot. He says he hears me, but he doesn’t always shoot it.’’

Pressey heard the call against sixth-ranked Baylor, draining four of Missouri’s season-high 14 3-pointers in a 72-57 win that solidified both what makes the Tigers so special and what makes the Bears so exasperating.

For 25 games now, the critics and doubters have circled, railing about what Missouri isn’t. Mostly, the Tigers aren’t big and haven’t been since Laurence Bowers went down with a torn ACL before the season.

Perhaps now, with the calendar bearing down on March, with the Tigers owning a 23-2 record and not only jockeying for a No. 1 seed in the NCAA tournament but also elbowing to earn the coveted St. Louis regional top spot -- and with three wins against top-10 opponents for the first time in 22 years -- it is time to finally discuss what Mizzou is.

“When Missouri is on, there is nobody in the country as good as them offensively in the country,’’ Baylor coach Scott Drew said. “Nobody. Period. And they’ve been on a lot this season.’’

Drew, who could double as a presidential candidate in his endless effort to spin positive on his own flailing team, for once wasn’t trafficking in hyperbole.

Three weeks ago, Drew decided his longer and taller team would be better served if the Bears played man-to-man against Missouri. Ricardo Ratliffe went for 27 points, with his speedy guards slicing and dicing the flat-footed defenders.

This time, Drew went zone, figuring it would slow the Tigers down.

“At the end of the day, when you play Missouri, you have to give up something,’’ Drew said. “We decided to give up the 3.’’

Phil Pressey
With Phil Pressey leading the way, Missouri's offense had Baylor baffled on Saturday.
He got that part right at least. The game was still tight, 38-37, after the under-16 timeout. In the Tigers’ next six possessions, they sank five 3-pointers.

It wasn’t tight after that. That four players scored those five 3s says everything about Missouri’s versatility.

That Pressey was one of them says even more. The sophomore can turn heads on one play and make people bang their heads on the next, a cat-quick guard who occasionally falls in love with the flair more than the finish. He was an offensive nonfactor in his previous two games, scoring just two against Kansas and five against Oklahoma.

The Tigers can and did win without him scoring, but when he does, he makes them that much better. With 12 in his pocket by the break, Pressey forced Baylor to honor his shot in the second and made the Bears pay -- by kicking the ball to Denmon, Kim English or Michael Dixon.

Asked how he would defend against his own team, Pressey wasn’t offering up any insight.

“I don’t know what I’d do,’’ he said with a smirk. “I can’t tell you what our weakness is. I’ll let you all figure that out.’’

Baylor, certainly, will be wondering for a while. In two games, the Tigers have left the Bears behind like roadkill, hitting them with two different styles yet two equally dominant wins.

And as much as this is about who the Tigers are, it is also an indictment of what Baylor is not.

Or more, what the Bears ought to be. Outside of Kentucky and North Carolina, there might not be a more NBA-loaded roster in the country. Yet in back-to-back games against their two biggest Big 12 rivals, the Bears have looked nothing shy of awful.

The Tigers and Jayhawks have outscored the Bears by an average of 12 points, scored 80.3 points and shot 53 percent. Against everyone else this season, Baylor is 15.9 points better, giving up only 60.5 points and 38 percent shooting.

The Bears have not just lost, but have been embarrassed by the Jayhawks and steamrolled by Missouri, leaving Drew to look for small slivers of a silver lining on a team that has too much talent to require so much searching.

Kansas’ Jeff Withey was the best big man on the floor last week. Steve Moore took the honors Saturday, outplaying, outworking and outhustling a big-boy lineup that includes Perry Jones III and Quincy Acy.

A game after his five-point APB showing against the Jayhawks, Jones scored four, shooting 2-of-12.

“Every night we depend on Perry Jones, so when he struggles, it hurts us,’’ Anthony Jones said. “We’re not the same team without him being Perry Jones.’’

Perry Jones is experiencing the burden of the anointed that is the reality of college basketball today. Drew is right when he says that “you are judged on your potential.’’ He’s also right that he has a fairly young team.

But Kentucky is a fairly young team with an awful lot of anointed players, and the Wildcats are toting the burden with aplomb.

Baylor, instead, is caving under it. The Bears are, barring a miracle, all but eliminated from the Big 12 race.

And instead of picking up steam, they are picking up doubters.

That’s just the opposite of Missouri. With every passing game, the Tigers are silencing the critics, showing that while they might be unorthodox, they are no less effective.

Makes sense.

This is the Show Me State, after all.

http://espn.go.com/blog/collegebaske...lor-and-mizzou

[mnchiefsguy]

Originally Posted by O.city

Think you guys will win in Lawrence?


If Ku wins I think they should just cancel the tourney and have KU and MU play at the Sprint.

I think this team CAN win in Lawrence. Kansas is a great team at home, and should be favored. But I think this team can do it. Will they do it? I have no idea.

[Saul Good]

Mizzou will move up to #3 with Ohio State's loss.

[Imon Yourside]

Originally Posted by Saul Good

Mizzou will move up to #3 with Ohio State's loss.

Ohio State looked like crap, and lolz one of the Sparty posters said Sullinger had a triple double 17pts/16rebs/10 turnovers.

[KcMizzou]

Contrast between Baylor, Missouri: stage fright



Missouri’s supposed to struggle against teams with size. Baylor is supposed to dominate smaller teams.

None of that happened on Saturday, as Missouri knocked down 14 3-pointers en route to a 72-57 win.

Baylor stubbornly stayed in its zone defense throughout the game, even when it was clear it wasn’t doing much to stop Missouri’s shooters. The Tigers consistently found open gaps in the corners, and exploited the lack of perimeter defense Baylor was showing. Marcus Denmon, Mike Dixon and Phil Pressey combined to shoot 12-for-22 from 3-point range, scoring 51 points between them.

Baylor’s size was a major factor early on, but the Bears simply couldn’t guard Missouri’s guards. How Missouri would match up with Baylor’s size populated much of the pregame discussion, but it was the other way around – Baylor couldn’t match up with Missouri’s four-guard lineup. Perry Jones was invisible for most of the game, while Baylor was unable to knock down jumpers at key points in the game. Gary Franklin, Pierre Jackson and Brady Heslip combined to shoot 2-for-13 from behind the arc for Baylor.

While Baylor possesses as much talent as anyone in the country, it’s troubling that Scott Drew’s troops can’t break through against the top teams in the Big 12. The Bears are now 0-4 against Missouri and Kansas. While that would not be a problem for most teams, it’s worth mentioning when you’re a Final Four hopeful. Baylor has all of the ingredients to make a deep run in March – except a killer instinct. Jones is the Bears’ best player, but he has never been a killer and he disappears in the biggest games. Freshman Quincy Miller was good tonight, but he can’t be the only player scoring. Does Baylor have enough mental toughness and intestinal fortitude to beat teams that punch back after taking the Bears’ initial punch?

Missouri is at the opposite end of the spectrum. The Tigers are simply fearless. Going against the bigs of Baylor wasn’t an issue – they gave up 15 offensive rebounds and were outrebounded by 13. It didn’t matter. Missouri makes teams adjust to them, not the other way around. Sure, Kim English is too small to really compete with Jones and Quincy Acy and other big guys inside, but they can’t guard him at the other end. Denmon was giving up plenty of height to Miller, but he’s also far too quick for the Baylor freshman. For every potential matchup problem, they respond with “well, what about when we’re on offense?” And fortunately for the Tigers, they’re the most efficient offensive team in the country.

Saturday’s game was a perfect contrast. There was one team that maximized its talent and didn’t back down, and another one that seemed to shrink on the biggest stages despite its size.

http://eye-on-collegebasketball.blog...83066/34800695

[O.city]

MU to number 3.



Congrats Tigers.

[O.city]

So where do you guys see MU fitting in, in the SEC?

Can they get to a Florida level?

[Trevo_410]

Originally Posted by O.city

So where do you guys see MU fitting in, in the SEC?

Can they get to a Florida level?

depends how fast are transfers adapt next year.