MICHAEL ATCHISON

A Trio for All Time

Michael Atchison

Alright class, if I could have your attention. Budget cuts have forced us to implement creative solutions to intractable problems. From now on, we’ll be teaching two subjects at once. Today’s lesson will combine history and statistics, and as always, Missouri basketball will provide the jumping off point. In upcoming weeks, we’ll delve into the tandem subjects of physics and poetry via study of Keyon Dooling’s charge (snicker) over Jelanni Janisse, and we’ll explore seismology and ballet by examining Monte Hardge’s low post grace. Tandem topics are particularly appropriate today because the tandem is the topic. Specifically, we’ll ruminate about Rickey Paulding’s and Arthur Johnson’s place in Tiger history.

The season hasn’t even started, but barrelfuls of ink already have been devoted to Mizzou’s senior tandem of Johnson and Paulding. Johnson is the preseason Big 12 Player of the Year. Paulding is on the AP’s early All-America team. Both are on the roll of Wooden Award candidates. Each shows up on the short lists of elite players published in preseason mags like Athlon, Lindy’s and Street & Smith’s. With three years behind them, Paulding and Johnson already have had accomplished careers. With so much expected from them as seniors, it’s time to ponder where they might eventually rank in the pantheon of Missouri greats, and especially Missouri’s great pairs of four-year teammates.

This much we know: They can score. Johnson enters the season with 1268 career points. Paulding is right behind with 1220. With 2488 points between them, Paulding and Johnson already rank as the sixth highest scoring tandem in Missouri history.

Of course, Chievous and his imaginary friend Lumpy could also make the list with their 2580 points (all by Chievous; Lumpy failed to score in limited play). But we are not here in praise of Lumpy. This lesson is about Slick Rick and Big Dock, the latest, greatest edition of the Detroit Tigers.

Last season, Johnson and Paulding scored 532 and 573 points respectively. If they repeat those numbers this year, Johnson will finish as Mizzou’s fifth all-time leading scorer with 1800 points, and Paulding will be right behind in sixth with 1793. Together, their 3573 points would make them the top scoring Tiger duo ever. Not only that, Johnson already leads the career blocked shots list with 197, and could wind up with almost twice as many as Stipanovich, who sits in second with 149. Moreover, with 859 career rebounds, Johnson currently ranks sixth all-time. A repeat of last season’s 316 boards would give him 1175, shattering Doug Smith’s record of 1053, and capping one of the gaudiest resumes in school history.

Those, of course, are just raw numbers, and they only mean so much. They don’t measure accomplishment. And when it comes to accomplishment, the gold standard for Tiger tandems is Steve Stipanovich and Jon Sundvold, the greatest inside/outside combination Mizzou has known. The All-Americans led the Tigers to four conference championships, 100 total victories (the most ever over a four-year span), and Missouri’s first-ever number one national ranking. The only reason the discussion doesn’t end there is that the Tigers went 3-4 in the NCAA Tournament in the Stipo/Sundvold era, never advancing beyond the Sweet Sixteen. As we enter the season, the only real competitors for the Greatest Duo distinction are Melvin Booker and Jevon Crudup. The Booker/Crudup years included two Big Eight Tournament titles, Mizzou’s only undefeated conference championship, an Elite Eight run, and a 4-3 overall NCAA Tournament record. The great 1993-94 season, in which they were the Tigers’ two leading scorers, pushes them past the others on the list, who were supporting players on championships teams (Anderson/Kennedy in 1976; Buntin/Coward in 1987 and 1990) or whose success failed to translate to the postseason (Mizzou did not win an NCAA Tournament game in the Chievous/Hardy years).

So where does that leave Paulding and Johnson? With some work to do. Statistically, they’re likely to wind up as kings of the hill, but that won’t mean much without some sort of banner to hang in the new arena. As anyone with Kansas tags is sure to let you know, Rickey and A.J. have never finished in the Big 12’s top four. A conference title would go a long way toward cementing their legacy, and some All-America recognition wouldn’t hurt, either. But the seniors’ real path to glory may reside in the postseason. In this age, the name of the game is the NCAA Tournament, and with a 5-3 tourney record in their three seasons, Paulding and Johnson already have more NCAA wins than any teammates in Mizzou history. They won’t match the four conference titles of Stipanovich and Sundvold, nor their 100 overall wins (unless the 2003-04 Tigers go 34-2 or better), but a Big 12 championship and four more tournament victories would rocket Paulding and Johnson past Booker and Crudup. Six more would make them immortals.

Now that we’ve put a bow on that marginally interesting and largely irrelevant discussion, let’s go back to statistics (it’s my column and I’ll be disjointed if I want to). Let’s expand beyond Paulding and Johnson and bring Travon Bryant into the conversation. Bryant came to Mizzou with expectations as high as any recruit in years, but his career has been up and down, and he has taken his share of criticism from Missouri fans. Still, statistically speaking at least, Bryant rounds out what should be the most productive three-man combination ever at Missouri. Depending on how deep the Tigers advance in the Big 12 and NCAA Tournaments, Bryant – by averaging between 11.5 and 14 points per game – could become the third member of his class to accumulate 1,000 career points, a feat never before achieved at Mizzou. In fact, no one has come close. A more reasonable goal would be for Bryant to reach 900 points (he is 305 away). No one has come close to that, either. Since freshmen became eligible for varsity play in the 1972-73 season, the closest a class has come to producing three thousand-point scorers was in 1994 when Booker and Crudup graduated with 1697 and 1498 points, respectively, and Lamont Frazier wound up his career with 667. Paulding, Johnson and Bryant are on pace to combine for close to 4500 points. No other class has reached 3900. Not only that, but Bryant has a legitimate shot to finish in the top 5 all-time in blocked shots and the top 15 in rebounds, while Paulding is a good bet to finish top 15 in blocks and top 20 in boards. With Johnson all but guaranteed the top spot on both lists, this trio could hold records for scoring, rebounds and blocked shots for a generation or more. Or, if we’re lucky, the current freshman class of Kleiza, Gardner and Laurie – or the next one of Grimes, Horton, Brown and Dandridge – can start to claim those records for themselves.

Around the conference: The highest and best use for any college basketball season preview is to revisit it after the season opens and laugh uncontrollably at the analysis contained therein. I mean, seriously, what was the dolt who wrote TigerBoard.com Big 12 Basketball Preview thinking? It’s not even Thanksgiving yet and the landscape looks considerably different than projected. At Oklahoma State, transfer Stevie Graham was expected to start on the wing with his twin brother Joey Graham duking it out with junior college transfer Tremaine Fuqua for the right to start alongside Ivan McFarlin in the post. As of now, none of those guys is in the lineup. Daniel Bobik, a transfer from Brigham Young, has secured the starting spot at shooting guard, while Jason Miller – a senior who averaged just 2.9 points per game last season – has worked his way into the lineup at power forward. Thus far, the Graham twins have earned substantial minutes in reserve roles, but Fuqua – who earned votes for Big 12 Newcomer of the Year and who is one of the nation’s top juco recruits – can’t even crack the Cowboys’ rotation and may be redshirted.

Baylor forward Harvey Thomas, another highly-touted junior college transfer, remains sidelined indefinitely while the university’s compliance committee determines whether he should be cleared to play. The fallout from the Dave Bliss scandals has left the Bears short on talent and depth, and Thomas had been expected to be one of the team’s top players. Forwards Terrance Thomas and Tommy Swanson have been pleasant surprises in the early going, but you have to wonder whether the Bears’ legs can hold up through the year. In Baylor’s opener (a 72-59 win over Texas Southern), four starters played at least 34 minutes each. There isn’t a lot of skill on the bench (without Harvey Thomas, the Bears can go two or three deep, max), and it is easy to imagine the starters wilting late in the season if they have to play extended minutes all year long.

At Oklahoma, the reports of Kevin Bookout’s demise appear to have been exaggerated. Bookout, the Sooners’ star sophomore big man, sat out Oklahoma’s exhibition games with a shoulder injury, but he returned to the starting lineup in both of OU’s contests in the season-opening Sooner Invitational, which Oklahoma won with victories over Eastern Washington and Oral Roberts. Still, the injury seems to have slowed Bookout, who averaged just 5.0 points and 4.5 rebounds in the event. An abdominal injury put Oklahoma senior swingman Jason Detrick on the bench for the two games, thus opening up a starting job for freshman guard Lawrence McKenzie as well as quality minutes for junior guard Jaison Williams. With Bookout not yet at full strength, Kelvin Sampson’s Sooners are leaning on their perimeter players for the bulk of their offense. Over the first two games, McKenzie, Williams and starting guards Drew Lavender and De’Angelo Alexander accounted for two-thirds of Oklahoma’s points. In one other roster note, Sampson has opted against redshirting freshman forward Brandon Foust, who played a total of 17 minutes in the Invitational.

Around the league, a few relatively unknown freshmen have begun to make names for themselves while more heralded newcomers bide their time. Jarrius Jackson, a Texas Tech guard, has been terrific in the early going, showing an ability to score and distribute the ball like a far more mature player. At Iowa State, guard Curtis Stinson started both of the Cyclones’ exhibition games and turned in a 19-point, 9-assist performance against Global Sports. Still, the most impressive and unexpected debut may have been by P.J. Tucker, an undersized freshman power forward from Texas, who collected 18 points and 13 rebounds in the Longhorns’ season-opening win over Brown, and then followed it up with 18 and 11 against Sam Houston State. Meanwhile, on the other end of the spectrum, Kansas State’s star frosh Cartier Martin is serving a three-game suspension for benefits he accepted in his high school days, and Kansas McDonald’s All-American J.R. Giddens is filling a reserve role while he works to shore up defensive shortcomings.

Questions, comments, random haiku? Send them to atchison@tigerboard.net. If anyone is reading (hello-ello-ello), maybe we’ll do a mailbag someday soon.