Pourover: Razor thin margins seal Mizzou’s fate

Mark Mitchell was a monster. As he’s been all year really. Mitchell scored 32 points, a career high, on Senior Day. He was, as he’s been all season long, and for most of the last two years, the Tigers most impactful player. What Mitchell needed was one teammate to be awesome with him. Instead he got

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Mark Mitchell was a monster. As he’s been all year really.

Mitchell scored 32 points, a career high, on Senior Day. He was, as he’s been all season long, and for most of the last two years, the Tigers most impactful player.

What Mitchell needed was one teammate to be awesome with him. Instead he got decent performances from three guys. Shawn Phillips was good, aside from four turnovers, Jayden Stone was good but didn’t score it enough, and Trent Pierce was solid. The problem was Mark Mitchell was great

and so was Meleek Thomas. Basically Thomas and Mitchell cancelled each other out. Arkansas just got better performances from Malique Ewin and Trevon Brazile, who were a little better than the second and third best Tigers.

The officials missed a goaltending call where Nick Pringle clearly interfered with a poor alley-oop pass from Brazile in the first half. The shot clock operator didn’t reset the shot clock when T.O. Barrett’s failed game winning shot hit the back iron causing a shot clock buzzer to sound with about a half second to play. The error likely forced Mizzou forward Trent Pierce to short arm a putback attempt thinking it was the final buzzer.

With a 1 point lead in Overtime, the officials held their whistle on an over the back call on Pringle, the foul forced Shawn Phillips out of bounds on his rebound attempt. But the ball went off Arkansas when it was fumbled a bit so they called it Missouri ball. When Arkansas challenged the call, they aren’t able to re-litigate their missed call on the foul, and instead saw Phillips toe on the line. They awarded Arkansas the basketball. The Hogs scored on the next play retaking the lead.

On the following possession DJ Wagner broke the plane of verticality and made contact with Anthony Robinson on a shot attempt. There was no call, and then Ewin hit a three — his third make from distance on the season — on the ensuing possession and now Missouri was in catch-up mode.

But they still had a 1 point lead with less than a minute left, and still had a chance to tie with less than 30 seconds to play.

They didn’t make the plays to win. The margins in this league are so thin. They’re razor thin. But Missouri isn’t alone.

One thing I was pondering while watching LSU and Texas A&M duke it out in three overtimes, is just how much this league can send one team spiraling, and another to the NCAA Tournament. The three overtime loss for LSU was their second loss to Texas A&M on the season. The first was a 75-72 loss in College Station. At the time, LSU was 36th in KenPom, and A&M was 51st. LSU had a lead with less than 3 minutes to play, and the teams played a tight and contested final few minutes before A&M was able to pull out the win.

The next game A&M won an improbably comeback game at Auburn, LSU lost at home to South Carolina. Texas A&M then beat Oklahoma at home, and LSU lost to Vanderbilt on the road. LSU would start conference play 0-4, A&M would start 3-1. Two teams were separated in two games by two possessions, showing they were pretty close overall. LSU is currently 63rd in KenPom, having lost their leading scorer Dedan Thomas for the year to an injury, and Texas A&M is 34th in KenPom. There’s a difference of about 6 points per 100 possessions.

Texas A&M is going to the NCAA Tournament. LSU is the 16th seed in the SEC Tournament, and going home afterward.

There were 52 games that came within 2 possessions in the final margin, out of 288 games. Missouri played in 9 of those games, so did Tennessee and Texas A&M. Here are the team by team records in close games:

Alabama 5-3
Arkansas 2-1
Auburn 3-5
Florida 1-1
Georgia 3-2
Kentucky 4-2
Missouri 7-2
Mississippi State 2-2
LSU 1-5
Oklahoma 3-4
Ole Miss 3-4
South Carolina 1-3
Tennessee 4-5
Texas 3-5
Texas A&M 5-4
Vanderbilt 4-4

In retrospect Missouri’s record in close games is remarkable. It’s a sign of good execution, good coaching, smart players.

The inconsistency of this season isn’t in the close losses, as you can see most teams hover around .500 in those close losses. Really excellent teams (Florida) rarely play in them. But the inconsistency of the losses that should have been closer, and close wins that maybe shouldn’t have been close. Missouri was inconsistent this year, yes. If we’re going to pick nits with this team, I’d point to losing at LSU and Ole Miss more than losing the close games against Arkansas or Georgia. Execute a little better in games up and down the schedule and you aren’t worried about whether Mississippi State or Oklahoma can win games late to keep you from playing on Wednesday.

Mizzou’s margins have been thinner than we want all season, but the butter is made. There’s nothing left to churn. They are who they are. The improvement they can make will come in April and May, not now. Now you’re just hoping to extend what you have as long as you can.

The season is nearly over. There is only the SEC Tournament to play, and then whatever the fates have for Missouri in the NCAA Tournament. Right now they’re fixed into the last four byes, meaning a 10 seed. It’s not great, but not bad either, considering where things stood at the beginning of conference play.

They’re not winning an SEC Championship. They’re not making a Final Four. But they can make some noise if the recipe is right. Let’s hope, for the sake of the seniors, and for Mark Mitchell in particular, Missouri can find a way to make a lot of noise before their eventual exit.