It wasn't great. But it was a win. Which means it wasn't a Quad 4 loss. If Mizzou had lost this game, the tournament hopes would have taken a pretty big hit. It did not lose this game. That's important.
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Dennis Gates said after the game that Mizzou was focusing on a lot of little things and South Carolina was making a bunch of shots to keep them in the game. He gave the Gamecocks a lot of credit and talked about how winning in February is tough. He's right. But it's also fair to be concerned a little bit. We all know that this season is almost certainly going to end in a loss like it does for everybody. And when it does, it's probably going to be because somebody shot lights out against the Tigers. It seems like a lot of somebodies do that. This one wasn't good enough to beat them mostly because it went cold in the last four minutes. But the defense is probably going to be what we talk about whenever that last game happens.
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Nick Honor and
Sean East came up huge in the second half. They combined with
Kobe Brown to score 37 of Missouri's 41 points after the break. I knew those three were good in the second half. I did not know they were that good. You expect it out of Kobe.
As I wrote in my column, he's the guy Missouri has to have do that. Then they just need a couple other guys every night. It doesn't have to be the same two. It probably won't be the same two. Tonight it was Honor and East. Next time it might be two different player.
*I thought
Aidan Shaw really gave Missouri good minutes. When South Carolina pushed ahead a little bit in the first half, Shaw came off the bench with a ridiculous dunk on one of Kobe's six assists, then he hit a three. He only played nine minutes, but I thought he turned the tide. Missouri went into the half with a five-point lead and I don't think they do that without Shaw's play.
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*I don't know on the
Isiaih Mosley situation, guys. I really don't. I thought we were past this. I can't say for sure if it's related to what kept him out for a month or if this is something completely different. And Gates isn't about to start telling us now.
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I've got to believe that wasn't exactly mutual agreement. I'm assuming the coach told him he wasn't playing tonight. I assume he will play Saturday at Tennessee, but I don't know. Trust me, I'm as frustrated as you guys are (well, maybe not quite, but it's frustrating). If I could tell you what was happening, I'd do it. We all respected his privacy the first time around, but if this is going to be an every game thing, at some point, you guys deserve some answers. If I get any, you'll get them. Until then, I don't know, I guess we just wait to see if he's at shootaround every night. Honestly, I joked with a couple people tonight that sometimes I wonder if Gates plays some sort of game at practice the day before every game and the two people who finish last don't get to play the next day. Because a few guys really seem to yoyo in and out of the lineup on this team. But he's the coach and he's winning, so most of the buttons he's pushing have been the right ones.
*Saturday's the toughest game of the year. Missouri hasn't been very good on the road and Tennessee's got the best defense in the country. A loss is expected. A lopsided loss won't surprise me. But don't lose your minds if it happens. Mizzou's at Auburn next Tuesday and the Tigers will have lost five of six by then assuming they don't beat Bama on Saturday. Win that one and the double bye comes back into play because right now, Mizzou is only a game behind Auburn and Kentucky for fourth place. Even if you lose that one, you're fine. Come back home, hopefully you have everybody available for the final five games of the year and you make a push and get some momentum headed into March. Because March matters again for Mizzou.
*Column, video and Drew's quick thoughts are on the front. He's working on the full notebook. Talk to you tomorrow.