Team Report: Mizzou conquers low-grade performance

Tigers defeat Murray State

(8-1) Missouri showed both sides to their team this past Saturday against (5-3) Murray State in a 75-64 win in Columbia. Mizzou was led by their seniors, who consumed well over half of the Tigers’ points. Leo Lyons contributed with 14 points and 12 rebounds to go along with DeMarre Carrol’s 13 points, and Matt Lawrence’s 14 points, which was anchored by three 3-pointers.

The Tigers have surprised many at the start they have had and are beginning to receive national attention, #28 with 44 votes if AP poll was to be extended. The Tigers are 6-0 at home this season, a place that they seem to NEVER lose at. In fact, Mizzou is riding a school-record 33 straight non-conference home wins. 26 straight under 3-year head coach Mike Anderson. They have torn up their home floor so far this season in those 6 wins, winning by an average of 28 points.

Although there was a ton of good in the game there was also a load of bad, which is evident seeing how close the final score was. Mizzou had a total of 19 turnovers in the game, and 11 of those came in the second half! Not only were we struggling with holding on to the ball, we couldn’t rebound either. When a team like Murray State out-rebounds you 35-33, you know something is wrong. Granted, rebounding isn’t Mizzou’s game, you still have to do it to win. Missouri’s style is: run wild all over the place on defense, create turnovers, and get points on the fast-break/transition and that works for them.

Missouri ’s 3 straight 90-point game streak was ended with the “stellar” Murray St. defense. Was it their defense or was it the fact that we cannot convert from the free throw line if our heart depended on it? The Tigers are 64% from the line this season. However, Leo Lyons saved the Tigers in the final two minutes when MST started fouling, and Mizzou hit 9 of 11 FT’s after they went the previous 38 minutes of the game at 10-18.

Murray State couldn’t be more different when it comes to shooting free throws. They are one of the best teams in the nation when it comes to the art of shooting the 15-footer. They were 80% from the stripe on Saturday night, which included Isaac Miles’ 5 points from the line. Miles played a total of 33 minutes and led the Racers with 18 points.

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The game was a continued string of runs it seemed like. The game started pretty generic and Murray State took their only lead on a 9-0 run to make it 20-21. As soon as that happened, Mizzou had a 9-0 run to regain the lead that they would keep throughout the game. The Tigers and Racers exchanged blows all the way up to half and at the intermission the game was still within reach, at 40-31. Coming out of the gates after halftime, MU tallied up the first 9 points of the second half... Right after that, MST went on an 8-0 run to re-establish life. Then the Tigers were turned loose again, up 57-40 with 12 left and they clearly thought the game was over. Little did they know that Murray State would then go on yet another 14-4 run led by freshman reserve Donte Poole who accounted for 6 of those 14 points. The scare must have been enough to make Missouri start nailing free throws in the final moments of the game and, essentially, that is what saved them from embarrassment and some reconsidering.

Mizzou plays game two of their 5-game home stretch against (3-3) Stetson this coming Saturday. Knock on wood, this should be a cake walk but I know as a sports player that is something I probably should not be saying, but let’s be honest here. Although I would put my money on Mizzou (quite a bit), Stetson did play with Florida State the entire 40 minutes but ended up on the wrong end of things with a 77-79 final. HOWEVER, if you look at teams that resemble us a little better you will see that this should be over quick; Stetson lost to Texas 38-68 and Miami 65-79. Not to mention, Stetson caps off a busy 3-game week with a game in Columbia. It doesn’t get any easier for Stetson after us... They play Florida a week from now. Really, Stetson’s only player is their all-around SF from Orlando, 6’5” Garfield Blair. Unless we let their go-to-man score all over us... This one should be over at half.

The same night that Stetson faces off against Florida, we will be squaring off against the always rivaled Fighting Illini for the annual Braggin’ Rights game in St. Louis. For the first time in a long time, and I mean long time, the Tigers should be favored over Illinois. Only time will tell if Missouri is for real but they have their first serious test since the Tigers upset the (at the time) #19 USC Trojans.

Please leave comments with your thoughts regarding this post.

By Justin Hulsey
StLDieHard24@gmail.com
Big12-fans.com, Missouri Correspondent

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