ozark trout fisher

Yes. Why has SLU not given him a long term offer yet? He could win national coach of the year and potentially not even be given a multi-year contract, which is...interesting.

SLU went from a clear NIT team to a potentially dangerous 5-7 seed in the tournament in the course of a couple weeks. What an amazing transformation. Sometimes the light just seems to come on for a team and that appears to be what happened for SLU. They weren't underrated all season...because for most of the season, they just haven't been that good. I mean, if you want to throw everyone off the scent, just lose to Santa Clara, Washington, and Rhode Island. That will do it. But something just changed overnight, and it's been fun to watch. They are a very real contender for a deep tournament run. A 2011 VCU style run to the final four honestly wouldn't be all that shocking.

Great win for SLU. Any remaining doubt about their tournament status is probably gone...now they can pretty much just spend the rest of the season continuing to improve and bringing up their seed as much as possible. The sweep of Butler is really impressive and it pretty much puts them in control as far as winning the regular season title in the Atlantic 10 goes. Amazing for a team that has gone through so much, and had some real low points this season (Rhode Island, Santa Clara.) They are a sleeper final four pick, in my opinion-if they can get decent match-ups in the tournament. The only teams that will most likely be able to take them down are ones that rely on very solid half-court offense and defense...so teams like Wisconsin, Michigan State, or pretty much any other elite team from the Big 10 would be tough for them, as they might be able to beat SLU at their own game. But teams that rely on athleticism and getting up and down the court will have all kinds of trouble with this team. Just ask VCU. Jim Crews probably needs to be considered for Coach of the Year (not to mention a multi-year contract!) As for the Missouri-Kentucky match-up tomorrow, that will be fun. Rupp arena will be tough for a team that struggles on the road, but Kentucky is just having a rough time of it now. The Nerlens Noel situation is pretty sad, and it seems to be really affecting them. Missouri should win handily, but given the way things have gone on the road so far I'd expect a close game that will go down the wire. Missouri is no longer in must win mode, but a good road win would probably lock up a tournament bid for good-and Missouri would be well served to remember that a quality tournament seed is still a possibility with a strong finish. So this is a pretty big game.

Oh, I can do both with equal enjoyment. I used to be very much in the category of liking to fish alone, but more and more that's changing for me. The one exception is wild trout fishing on small streams...hard to do that with other people around, for purely practical reasons. But everything else being equal I prefer to fish with a friend. It's just better for me in almost every way. Although when I'm alone I've taken to bring my dog with me often as not, which makes it considerably nicer.

Was going to maybe go out and try this weekend, but safe to say that won't happen unless I invest in some snow shoes! There's about a foot of snow outside, and it's still coming down. Oh well, we need some real winter weather, so I'll take the trade-off.

Another interesting aspect of this that is starting (finally) to get some press, is whether Missouri in fact has the best home-court advantage in college basketball. You'd never suspect that to be the case (after all, compared to Phog Allen, Cameron Indoor, or Assembly Hall, Mizzou arena just doesn't feel that intimidating), but with teams like Kansas, Duke, and Kentucky taking some home losses over the past couple of years it is starting to become a real question. The 82-4 home record over the past four years, and the 30-1 streak over the past two seasons would seem to indicate that it's possible. Of course a lot of that is just due to the overall high quality of play over most of that time. But it's especially striking when you consider the home/road split this year. Before the Florida game you could have just chalked it up to us playing a lot of average to below average teams at home, but so much not after last night. After I post this, just watch them go down to LSU and Arkansas at home though...

This was not one of the first things I noticed about the game...I guess he may have been as excited as everyone else about beating arguably the best team in the country...

A good day for Mizzou basketball continues to get better, it seems. The NCAA released it's charges against Haith, and they reportedly do not include "unethical conduct."That is basically NCAA-speak for a really serious violation that would most likely result in Missouri having to fire him...But this was somewhat unexpectedly not included. The NCAA charges he did receive appear to be borderline insignificant. So unless this takes an unexpected turn, Frank Haith's job seems pretty safe. To the game, it was obviously Missouri's best performance of the season. I loved the heart they showed coming back from a big-time deficit against a team that is statisically the best in the country. You just couldn't ask for a better win, or a more exciting way for it to happen. Missouri now moves to 19-7 (8-5 in SEC) with an RPI in the low 30s. There's this marquee win against Florida to go with good wins over Illinois, VCU, and Ole Miss. Missouri probably just needs to go 2-3 the rest of the way (to get to 10-8) to make the tournament. A 3-2 finish should really close the deal. But honestly, with games against South Carolina on the road, and LSU and Arkansas at home, that should be pretty manageable. The bigger concern right now is getting their seed up to a point where it's easier to make a run to the Sweet 16 or better. A 5 or 6 seed is still very much a possibility with a strong finish. Winning out (a fairly legitimate possibility now) could move the seed as high as a 4, if we can make it to the SEC championship game. But we could just as easily falter down the stretch, and end up with an 8-10 seed. Should be interesting. But I am getting ahead of myself. It will be interesting how they handle a tough game at Kentucky this weekend. On paper, they should win, but I don't think anyone would be surprised with another road loss. It would be awesome to finally beat a good team on the road, and I think our seeding would definitely benefit from that.

Both teams played very well today. I didn't see the SLU game but not even Duke could beat VCU by double digits-so it must have been impressive. At the end of the day any debate about who is better between the two teams is just silly. Both are good teams with chances to do big things in March. And both just may have punched their ticket to the tournament today, barring a pretty serious late season collapse. A good day, I would have to say.

St. Louis University. They are one of the better programs in the Atlantic 10. Mizzou has been playing very well over the past three games. They blew out a very good Ole Miss team, crushed (an admittedly struggling) Mississippi State team on the road, and fell by two points on the road to a good Arkansas team. I've actually been impressed with the level of play. If Mizzou is a garbage team, then we are watching different games. If our point guard is a "stupid clown" then once again, we are looking at a different player. Because I see the SEC's leader in assists and one of the top 5 in the nation in that category as well. Pressey shoots too much but he is still very much an elite level point guard. He wouldn't be a first round NBA draft prospect otherwise. We are very lucky to have him on our team. And with that, I'm done. I'm looking forward to watching Mizzou take on Florida. Hopefully SLU can win and we can all be happy.

Wow. Mizzou is 18-7, 7-5 in a conference very comparable to the Atlantic 10. Mizzou is not a garbage team by any stretch of the imagination, and yes, short of something akin to a collapse they will be in the tournament come March. SLU is playing better now but Mizzou got big time wins out of conference (like the victories over a ranked VCU team and an Illinois team that is currently tearing through the Big 10 on a path to a high tournament seed), and that part of the season still does matter come selection Sunday. Schedule strength is also important (Mizzou knows about that after last year), so the fact that they scheduled a whole bunch of tough games pre-conference is helping them, even though a couple are losses. Go play some top 25 teams out of conference, and you are rewarded. Missouri is benefiting from that this year. Personally I'm a Missouri fan, always will be. I watched from beginning to end the 5-7 football season this year so 18-7 in basketball doesn't seem so bad. I don't love the RPI or the other metrics used, but how else are you objectively going to seed teams in a tournament when they aren't playing similar schedules...when there's a better way they will probably use it.

I agree that March should be exciting this year. There are no truly great teams (outside of maybe an underrated Florida team) so there is a lot of room for unexpected teams to find their way to the final four. I'll be surprised if a team a 5 seed or worse doesn't make the final four this year. It's just been one of those seasons. The #1 ranked team in the country lost to a team that came into the game 2-7 in conference play. The second ranked team in the country this year lost to Florida Gulf Coast. The third ranked team is a member of the West Coast Conference, while the fourth ranked team (Michigan State) didn't start playing elite-level basketball until about two weeks ago. So plenty of chances for upsets.

I will be watching the Missouri game, as usual. I really do like SLU, but I'm a Missouri fan first and foremost regardless of the record...It's absolutely nothing against a very good SLU team and has little or nothing to do with Mizzou being in a so called "power conference" (the Atlantic 10 may be the slightly better conference this year, actually)- it's just how it's always been for me and probably always will be. And honestly, if this is a bad and frustrating season for Mizzou, we've really let ourselves get used to the good times. Because by the standards of your average program, Missouri is having a very good season. But we've all been spoiled ever since 2009. But since this post is primarily about St. Louis, they have a chance to earn there ranking now. Within the next few days, they play VCU and Butler. If they win both, they deserve to be ranked. They probably need at least a split to stay safe to make the tournament, though it's not completely necessary. Really, both Missouri and St. Louis are in similar situations...probably tourney bound but needing to earn their way in from here on out, though I'll grant you St. Louis' played has probably played better lately. But for whatever reason, I think that St. Louis' RPI is much worse than their level of play (45), which is slightly troubling. But if they can continue to play well, and get wins against Butler and/or VCU, they can make that not matter. It's even (remotely) possible that if they both get in, the two could meet in the first round of the tournament in an 8 vs. 9 or 7 vs.10 game. That would be a fun game, to say the least. Short of that, I hope SLU makes a long run in the tournament. I thought they were given a somewhat unfairly low seed last year, and it made it very tough for them to make a deep run. Chances are the seed will be low again, but maybe the draw will be better, and the team should benefit from last year's tournament experience. No 1 or 2 seed should be excited about facing SLU in the second round.

Pressey is a brilliant player, but there has just been too much pressure on him. Keion Bell is a solid ball handler but is in no way a true point guard. He is great at driving and finishing, but his passing skills just aren't anything close to Pressey's. Some teams can have moderate success without using a true point guard but usually that is a system that doesn't work long term. Good defensive teams can generally pick that apart. Fact is, Pressey is still a good point guard and more importantly, our only point guard. He contributes a lot, and also takes away a lot. Most star players do. The question to ask, at the end of the day, is where would this team be without him? I think that Mizzou would be lucky to even be in contention for an NIT bid. Bell is a wing, and can run the offense for 7-8 minutes a game when Pressey is out. Bell has been tremendous for us. He might even be our most consistent scorer now. But he's still not a point guard. Pressey is a bit like Rajon Rondo in NBA terms. A great passer who can make his teammates better when he is in pass-first mode, but also a poor outside shooter who sometimes doesn't seem to realize when the shots aren't going down. And he is not a great finisher when he drives to the basket-as you would expect from someone who is 5'10". But when he is playing well, I'd take him over any point guard in the country. Remember he is still just a junior. He could probably benefit from staying another year in Columbia, although if he's gonna be a first round pick it would probably be in his best interest to go early. Especially if the Haith situation ends up worse than we hope.

The Florida game should be fun. I truly believe Mizzou can hang with anyone at home, but Florida will be the best team we've had in our building all year. Mizzou can win, but they absolutely have to play the kind of defense they have the past couple of games. Florida's own defense is elite, so if Mizzou simply tries to outscore them it will be ugly again. I think Bowers and Oriakhi will have to step up. We don't need to make (or take) a bunch of threes, but if we shoot 14% like Saturday it will also be hard to expect anything but a blow-out loss. Missouri really needs to have the offense they had against Ole Miss, and defense they had against Miss. St and Arkansas. Missouri has had very good offense a whole lot of the time, and good defense some of the time, but has never really put the two together in one game with the possible exception of Illinois They've got to find a way to put everything together tomorrow. If so they probably get out of there with the best win of the season to date. But it's a whole lot to ask. Mizzou has the capability to be a dominant rebounding team as well. I believe we are #3 in the country and best in the SEC in that regard. But Florida actually badly outrebounded us in our first meeting, one of very few teams to be able to do that. If Missouri can change that, it could completely alter the outlook of the game. Obviously, this game is extremely important. With a win, Missouri can spend the rest of its season working on improving its tournament seed, maybe even working its way up to a 5 or a 6 seed. With a loss, the tournament bubble talk will really kick into gear...though I think it would still be premature. Mizzou's path to the tournament should be pretty clear, win or lose tomorrow, as long as they can get to 10-8 in conference. But we're a lock if we win, for all intents and purposes.

I couldn't agree more with this. The NCAA tournament will not be played in hostile arenas, and most teams aren't going to get the vast majority of calls the way Arkansas did yesterday. I'm not even complaining. That's just how it goes when you are playing on the road in an environment like Bud Walton was yesterday. It reminded me of how Kansas must of felt when they came to Mizzou arena last year, honestly. The more I really look at it, the less concerned I am about Mizzou making the tourney. At two games above .500 in the SEC (7-5), Mizzou would be easily in the tournament if the season ended today. So unless we do something like lose to South Carolina, I have every reason to believe if Missouri can just get to 10-8 they should most likely be in the tournament (unless maybe they lose their first game in the SEC tournament.) Probably with a really low seed (maybe even one of the "First Four" games), but did that stop teams like VCU or Butler from making runs in the tournament in the past? Not really. Still plenty to like about this team, and honestly, I still think they are a threat to go as far as the Elite Eight, maybe further. They are built for the tourney, especially if we rely more on getting the ball to Alex Oriakhi and Laurence Bowers than outside shooting. Just got to avoid taking some bad losses down the stretch to give yourself the opportunity.

He had a rough game but I thought he handled the last minute basically okay. Honestly, the team as a whole did. They were in an excellent position to win up 4 with around 30 seconds to go. A couple somewhat questionable and one calls go the wrong way for MU, and all of a sudden they are in a position where they have the ball down two with five seconds on the clock. Arkansas could draw a foul on pretty much any shot around the rim all day long. Missouri really didn't stand a chance from the moment Arkansas decided to do that instead of shooting threes late in the game. And even if Missouri was "clutch" (a concept that statistics show is very overrated) the odds of winning or even forcing overtime with that little time left on the clock is very low. So here we are with another close road loss, saying that this team just can't handle close games. I just don't buy it. Close games involve a lot of luck. Missouri has been on the wrong end of that a whole lot lately. I think we are 2-4 in games decided by 3 points or less. And that includes all three of our "worst" losses. Though none of Missouri's losses this season are truly bad. Even LSU will probably sneak into the RPI top 100 after a win today pushed them up to 15-8 on the season. Arkansas is now a bubble team...A&M and LSU will probably be playing in the NIT, so it's not like we have lost to the dregs of the league. This is why despite a semi-mediocre win-loss record and a poor SEC, Missouri has yet to find itself truly on the bubble. The computer numbers are still good, and quality wins against three almost sure tournament teams (Illinois, VCU, and Ole Miss) are more than most teams that are fighting for the last few bids can hold up. Illinois' resurgence has actually been the best thing to happen to Missouri in the last couple of weeks. But that said, they have put themselves in a position where a whole bunch more work needs to be done to seal a tournament spot up for good. A win against Florida would probably do it. But MIssouri will likely have some more close games down the stretch, and at least a couple probably will need to be wins.

Yep. I was about to post the same thing. It is normal not to get the calls on the road, and it seems like Mike Anderson's 40 minutes of heck system is crafted to take advantage of that to the fullest extent. Thus you have the great home/road disparity. Missouri played well and is still probably fine to make the tournament. Mizzou should soundly defeat Arkansas and LSU at home (especially since MIzzou lost on the road to both of those teams, and will be unlikely to look past them), and probably South Carolina on the road. Win one of Florida/Kentucky/Tennessee and Missouri should be safe, with one win in the SEC tournament. Sounds doable, though not exactly a given.

Thanks guys. Sounds like there are a lot of good options. Will probably try several of these places. Sounds like I won't have to wait as long to get started as I thought...Didn't think the fishing would really get going into March/April. Good to have something to chase in the month of February besides trout. Even if I get skunked at some (or all) of these places it will be fun to try something different at least and see some new places.

Hope you're wrong but it wouldn't be a shock. Missouri will luckily have the opportunity to return the favor amply in Columbia, if we should lose in Fayetteville. Mike Anderson coming back to Mizzou arena should result in a packed house...and plenty of inspired play. Bet you Frank Haith and Missouri's entire roster has both of these games circled on the calendar. Got to go on the road first though.

Worth a thought. The proximity would definitely be a plus on that.

With early spring not too far away I'm really starting to think along the lines of doing something besides trout fishing...not that this ever gets old but a change of pace is always a good thing. Walleye are one species of fish that I have to say I've pretty much never fished for (at least successfully), here in Missouri or anywhere else for that matter. I know there are some good places to fish for them in Table Rock, Bull Shoals, Lake of the Ozarks etc, but I really do not have the set-up (or even the desire) to fish for them on big water like that. I have tried walleye fishing on Bull Shoals and we'll just say that the end result was me getting bored, quiting, and spending most of the rest of my time trout fishing in the tailwater. And I've spent just about all my time fishing this winter in the deep Ozarks, and as ridiculous as it sounds I'm even looking for a bit of a change of pace from even that. So I'd like to spend a couple of weekends trying something new, probably in early to mid-March. So I was wondering if there were any really worthwhile lakes or streams in central (or northern) Missouri that are worth checking out. I'll certainly be using a boat, but preferably if it's a lake, I'd want it to be one that I could at least have a marginal chance of having success in without a fish finder..and the MIssouri/Mississippi River are probably out for similar reasons. Long Branch Lake caught my eye as one possibility, as did the Salt River near Mark Twain. Also (more in the Ozark region) I've heard that the very lower sections of the Gasconade are good, and I'd certainly be up for trying that (more in the comfort zone of someone who spends a lot of time fishing Ozark streams.)Thanks for any help. I know this is technically out of place on this forum (because most of the waters I'm looking at are not even marginally in the Ozarks), so I hope that can be forgiven.

Well, I guess it's time for whatever this newest rendition of the Border War rivalry is called to get started for the first time. The name of our new rival is even (mostly) the same:) And they will have our old coach, which should make this thing pretty fun and heated right away...The stakes probably aren't as high for either team as the KU games last year, but both teams need this for their tournament resume. And I'm guessing there are plenty on here on both sides of this one. Anyway, I'm really looking forward to starting what should be our first real rivalry in the SEC tomorrow. Who have you got in the game? I think Phil Pressey and Laurence Bowers especially will come and play their hearts out given the situation, but I just don't think it will be enough in front what should be a tough crowd for a team that has struggled on the road. It will most likely come down to ball handling. Can Pressey (and to a lesser extent Bell) handle the havoc style that a Mike Anderson team will run. If they do, Mizzou should be in a great position to win. If not, we could easily get run off the floor and the game could be over by half-time. The results have been mixed. Mizzou has played three teams with a similar style this year (Louisville, VCU, and LSU.) Missouri got blown out by Louisville, snuck past VCU, and lost a close one to LSU. So this will be a challenge, to say the least. We've also got to keep them from getting too many open three point looks. Either way I'm looking forward to Saturday (and even more to when we get to welcome them to Mizzou arena.) Prediction: Arkansas gets a big lead at half-time..Missouri makes a run at the game but comes up short. 87-75 Arkansas.

On the rivers I fish I do sometimes associate the mill dams with good things...mainly slowing spotted bass and other invasives from moving upstream completely at will. But it seems like this function of mill dams never works forever. There will almost always be a flood big enough that a few will get upstream. In streams where this doesn't apply, I just don't really have a use for any kind of barrier to native fish migration. On trout streams (although this applies at least marginally to smallmouth water as well) it can really warm up the water during the summertime. And mill-ponds on Ozark streams rarely have great fishing anyway, except on streams that have good populations of largemouth. Now the fishing right below just about any mill dam is a different story...It doesn't seem to matter what species are in a river, there will almost always be good concentrations of fish. But in all I think the affects are mostly negative, though probably not severely so in the majority of cases. I know some mill dams have a lot of history too, which probably has to be considered to some degree.

So, um, Missouri isn't looking for it's first road win anymore. Beat Mississippi State last night 78-36. I realize that this Miss St. isn't a great team but it was still very nice to see that this team is actually capable of winning on the road in this conference, and doing so emphatically. And this is coming off our best performance of the season, a 19 point home win against Ole Miss. Pressey has had two straight excellent games. Against Ole Miss he was primarily a scorer, and a more efficient one than usual. Against Mississippi State I think he had 8 assists and just one shot. That is a pretty good stat-line for Pressey, in my opinion. Though I don't mind him taking some shots just so long as they're in the flow of the offense. Bell and Brown played really well. Just a very promising game, all said. On a side note, I felt really bad for Mississippi State. They literally had no bench last night (I think they have seven or eight total players, counting non-scholarship guys. )And they lost one of their better guards for a decent portion of the game due to injury. So this game was probably always going to be a little unfair, to be honest. They're pretty much all freshman and sophomores, so they are sure to improve greatly in the coming years. I think they have a good coach who was just dealt a tough hand with a whole bunch of injuries.