Missouri Tigers Vs. Tennessee Game Preview

The Missouri Tigers look to avoid losing three straight Saturday night when they host Tennessee. The Tigers enter the game at 7-9 (1-2) while the Vols come to Columbia at 10-5 (2-1).

Missouri was beaten down by top ranked Kentucky earlier in the week 86-37 and UT upset No. 19 Arkansas 74-69. Both teams are young, both teams have coaches in their first year at the school.

One of the more interesting storylines are the coaches. Kim Anderson replaced Frank Haith after he bolted for

Dec 30, 2014; Kansas City, MO, USA; Missouri Tigers head coach Kim Anderson reacts to a call in the second half against the Oklahoma State Cowboys at Sprint Center. Oklahoma State won the game 74-72. Mandatory Credit: John Rieger-USA TODAY Sports

Tulsa, and Donnie Tyndall took over for Cuonzo Martin who took the at Cal.

Both coaches were left next to nothing in terms of scholarship players, and had to scramble for recruits the entire off-season. Tennessee has five freshmen on their roster, Missouri has six.

Tyndall, interestingly, was the head coach at Southern Miss last year and actually ended the Haith era at Mizzou in Mizzou Arena, no less. His Golden Eagles beat Haith’s Tigers 71-63 in the NIT.

Up until their last game, Tennessee had a really hard time scoring. Their 74 points against Arkansas were the most they’ve had all season. This was in response to the 38 points they scored in a loss at home to Alabama.

The Tigers slightly have a scoring advantage, averaging 65 points per game, good for 248th overall. Tennessee only score 64.6 PPG, only eight spots behind Mizzou at 256th.

Jan 13, 2015; Knoxville, TN, USA; Arkansas Razorbacks guard Anthlon Bell (5) guards Tennessee Volunteers guard Josh Richardson (1) during the game at Thompson-Boling Arena. Mandatory Credit: Randy Sartin-USA TODAY Sports

For Tennessee, their go to guy has been senior guard Josh Richardson. Richardson is averaging 16.4 PPG and has only been under double figures once this season.

Kevin Punter, a former Missouri Tigers commit coincidentally, has also been a reliable scorer at 10.1 PPG.

An undersized 6-5 forward, Armani Moore is their leading rebounder at 6.9 per game, and also came up huge in their upset over the Razorbacks.

The Vols aren’t very big, and they also lack depth. The key for Missouri in this game, and probably most games, is to attack the basket; feed the ball to Jonathan Williams III and Keanau Post down-low and have them either draw contact for fouls or float easy buckets over undersized defenders.

Defensively, the Tigers need to be in complete lockdown mode on Richardson and Punter.

This may be a daunting tasks for Wes Clark and Keith Shamburger, not because they don’t have the defensive ability to do so, but because Clark and Shamburger stand at 6-1 and 5-11 respectively. Richardson and Punter are much bigger at 6-6 and 6-4.

Kim Anderson said that Teki Gill-Casear would again be “doubtful” for this contest so Namon Wright will probably get the start again. Wright matchups up against Tennessee’s backcourt a little nicer because he’s 6-5.

This is a pretty interesting matchup against two teams that were almost left for dead after their seasons last year. Tennessee is a little further along than Missouri is at this point.

It’s going to be interesting to see how each young, developing team responds to maybe season-changing games in their last outings.

For Tennessee: are they ready to go on the road and build on an impressive win, or are they overconfident becausethey look at Missouri’s performance at Kentucky and think it’s going to be easy?

For Missouri: do they accept what happened at Kentucky and use the huge loss as motivation, or did that 49

Dec 13, 2014; Columbia, MO, USA; Missouri Tigers guard Namon Wright (12) goes for a shot over Xavier Musketeers guard Remy Abell (10) during the second half at Mizzou Arena. The Xavier Musketeers defeated the Missouri Tigers 74-58. Mandatory Credit: Dak Dillon-USA TODAY Sports

point drubbing kick a very young team so far down that they can’t get up?

It’s going to come down to which team exploits the other teams’ weakness the most. In the end I see a close, low-scoring game and guard play deciding the outcome.

The Vols win in a grinder 51-47.