Mizzou Bball

[stlfisher]

Holy Cow!!!

There is more to both sides of these stories!

Yep, all kinds of info still to come.

[ness]

Anybody keeping score on how many Mizzwho b-ball players have brought disgrace to the program and the state? It's even worse than the football mess for sure, but maybe not as bad as the Cardinals steroid scandals that basically ruined baseball. I won't even go into the crooked politics, mafia activity, the worst crime in the country, transfer to SEC, the support for slavery or the Lawrence massacre. What a cesspool!

[ozark trout fisher]

This is just turning into a bit of a weird year for Missouri basketball. Not a bad year, hopefully...I think this is a good team, but just odd. How do you beat a couple of pretty good, likely NCAA tournament teams (VCU and Stanford), and then pretty consistently go into half-time either trailing, or tied with opponents that are almost certainly not going to be top 100 teams? What is it about waiting until the second half to get going? It almost makes me wonder if they just like to see the fans sweat it out a little bit...

Anyway, Laurence Bowers has been wonderful. He's the only thing keeping our offense afloat at times. Oriakhi has been good all year defensively and as a rebounder, but is starting to really become an offensive threat. We're getting production from the bench in Stefan Jankovic (especially today) and Tony Criswell. Honestly, I think our biggest question right now might be at point guard. Phil Pressey is a great player. He might be the player of the year candidate I expected at the end of the season. But he's clearly still adjusting to the new personel. And that's okay, as long as he continues to make progress, which I think he will. Webster Chan really could develop into a solid point guard as well. He did pretty well today when Pressey was on the bench. I think he will continue to improve, and his ceiling should be pretty high.

Illinois looks tougher than expected. That should be an interesting game.

[Justin Spencer]

As someone who grew up watching the Jayhawks, you never blow out every team no matter how good you are. Often times the best teams play to their competition as they rely on their talent sometimes a little too much. Both the Tigers and Jayhawks have had some poor games against weak teams only to have good games against tougher competition. It's alot easier to get mentally prepared to go play a team you feel might beat you as opposed to Tennessee State, who you didn't even know existed until you saw your schedule. I love basketball because until league play it is more or less practice games. It's probably easier for the coach to teach after a lackluster performance than it is after a blowout. The hard part is to avoid playing to your competition in the first couple rounds of the tournament.

[snap]

I like the way the tigers adjusted after half in both the semo and tenn st games. They were a different team that got after it, especially on D, and took it to the hole on the offensive end. I do not know if they will win as many games as last year, but I think they will be a better team!!!! So much bigger, stronger, and deeper, .....they have to advance deeper in the tournament than they did last year!!!! (which is not saying much)

[ozark trout fisher]

It'll be interesting come tourney time (assuming Mizzou is in it, not a certainty.) Could be wrong, but I see this team most likely being a 7 seed or lower. We should get plenty of wins in the SEC, but the conference as a whole looks down this year and even a 11-7 or 12-6 record in conference might not look all that impressive. Kentucky looks to be down (although I think they'll improve), and other usual SEC powers like Mississippi State and Vanderbilt look to be in total rebuilding mode. Florida looks great....but other than that, there aren't a whole lot of teams that look capable of contending for the NCAA tournament...The only teams I think that look safe at all are Florida, Kentucky, Alabama, and Missouri, though I wouldn't be surprised if at least one of the four didn't make it. Tennessee, Ole Miss, or Arkansas could get there, but don't look particularly likely to right now. So to get a good seed (like a 4 or a 5) Missouri would probably have dominate with at least 13-15 conference wins, which won't be easy.

That said, I see there being a lot of improvement as the season goes on, and provided they get there, even as a lower seed Missouri could still be a real threat to win a couple games in the tournament.

[Al Agnew]

There are still lots of wild cards, maybe most importantly Jabari Brown. He's apparently not a point guard candidate, but if he's the shooter and three point threat that everybody is talking up, he could make a real difference once he gets into the flow of the offense. I can't wait to see how good he actually is.

Losing Dixon hurt. He wasn't the best point guard you'd ever see, but he could take over from Pressey for a few minutes at a time, and he was a three point threat and could score in multiple ways.

Right now, we still don't really have a good idea what kind of players Mizzou has in Bell and Ross. Those two are going to be a real key to the season. If they can play tough defense, rebound, and become consistent ten point per game scorers, the team will be tough to beat. But so far they've been very inconsistent on offense, with some games looking totally lost on the offensive end.

Webster-Chan, I think, will be a more consistent three point threat as the season goes along, and he already plays good defense and gets a lot of rebounds for a guard.

Jankovic is going to be a work in progress all year. If he can get better and foul less on defense, he'll see more minutes, and he can score from three and around the basket. He has a tremendous upside, but we may not really see it this year.

Rosburg is what he is. He'll give you a few good minutes, but he won't be a huge factor this year. Oriahki is getting better on finishing, so he's more of an offensive threat than he was starting out, but he still doesn't get himself to an open spot when Pressey is penetrating.

I think Haith must have had a talk with Pressey. He showed a lot more point guard and a lot less scoring mentality this last game. But the key still is the players around him finding their spots and their roles, and hitting open shots, because he's not going to be looking for them if they can't make shots.

Bowers is far and away the most consistent player on the team at this point. I just hope the others can step up their game so that defenses can't key on Bowers.

[Chief Grey Bear]

Let me ask you guy's this. When you first heard the name of Frank Haith as being the new head coach, what was your thought? Had you even heard of him?

My first reaction was, we are screwed! I thought it was a desperate but albeit, stupid decision. But, I'll say this, I sure have changed my mind. I feel know he was a top level coach in need of a top tier program.

[ozark trout fisher]

I certainly felt the same way about Haith when he was hired...We go from potential home runs like Matt Painter and Shaka Smart to some guy that basically no one in this state had heard of. But goodness has he proved us wrong.

It was so easy to look at his record at Miami and find fault with it, as pretty much all of us did. But in many ways, he may have actually been the most successful coach in the history of that program...Going to the NIT every and an occasional NCAA tournament isn't easy there. So yeah, I missed that. Glad it seems I was wrong about him. He has got his work cut out for him this year though-plenty of talent, but it's gonna take awhile to mesh it.

But so far, I've been impressed with how he has handled it. Getting freshman (especially Webster-Chan, but also Jankovic and others) to contribute significantly right away has been key. I feel like he's still trying to figure out exactly what he wants from Bell and Ross, but that will come. I've also been impressed by the steady progress in Oriakhi's offensive game. For whatever reason the coaching staff at UConn didn't seem particularly interested in developing that, but obviously Haith has other plans.

[snap]

If the tigers keep getting better, as I think they will, I see them as at least a 3 seed!!! This is a team not ranked to start the year and now 12 or so!!! Illinois will be a big game for them!!!