Some random thoughts following yesterday's game

Posted on: February 10, 2019 at 10:46:07 CT

Assuming you don't count the Kim Anderson years as being MU basketball, that was the worst team we have lost at home to since at least the opening game of the 2005-06 season (Quin's final one) when Sam Houston State knocked us out of the preseason NIT where the early round games were played at host school gyms. That was an abysmal A&M team, probably the worst conference opponent we have faced since the down Ricardo Patton years of Colorado.

Again, assuming you don't count Kim's years as actually being MU basketball that has to be the least talented roster MU has taken the court with since at least 1973-74 (but I would argue that team still had considerably more talent). Every game we played in Kim’s first season as MUs coach had roughly twice as much talent as our squad yesterday. That was just a horrid matchup, I think we set the game of SEC basketball back decades with that contest. I can not believe how untalented we were as a whole yesterday. And as an added bonus, both teams played very poorly and sloppily as well.

I thought Pinson probably played his best game as a Tiger, but it appears I was wrong in contending that Geist would thrive by primarily being moved off the ball to focus on scoring. He was all kinds of out of sorts and out of rhythm, looked very unsettled in that role.

Its an astounding testament, but Reed Nikko was BY FAR the best post player on the court for either team and it really hurt us when he fouled out. When he wasn't in the game, they were able to play a 5 guard lineup for long stretches and have no issue at all because we had no other post presence.

Outside of Pinson, our bench gave us 0 points in 34 combined minutes. None of them even came close to scoring. The fact that there is such a massive dropoff from our almost entirely ineffective starting 4 in Puryear to either of his backups is crazy. It seems impossible that either Mitchell Smith or KJ Santos could make any kind of positive offensive contribution, and Smith is a disaster defensively as well.

I'm not entirely convinced that TJ Starks hadn't conspired with gamblers before the game, and I wouldn't be shocked to learn he has an 'unfortunate accident' after despite his performance at times we simply did not allow them to lose. He looked like Rickey Clemons during the final few games of the 2002-03 season.

It is astounding how little we were able to get to the line that game. 4 total free throw attempts against an opponent with a complete inability to protect the rim.

Its hard to gauge how far away MU actually is, because of how many pieces are not taking the court for us. But against that craptastic lineup A&M threw out there with their terrible coach and little motivation, there were very long stretches in the second half where it seemed an impossibility for MU to generate a good shot and score points from the field. For the most part our defense kept us in the game, but eventually you have to be able to score points or even the crappiest opponent ends up passing you up on the scoreboard. If we don't hit those two late meaningless threes you are talking about being outscored by 24 points in the second half at home to a 1-8 conference opponent that is barely fielding a team.

That was a very very winnable game. Things are going to get dismal down the stretch if we don't get guys healthy and if everyone doesn't stay bought in and motivated.

Edited by FIJItiger at 11:19:36 on 02/10/19