Missouri Tigers Basketball Wraps Up Disappointing Regular Season

The 2014-2015 Missouri Tigers basketball regular season finally ended last Saturday night with a fitting 52-43 loss to Mississippi State in Starkville. The Tigers enter the SEC Tournament as the No.14 seed and play No.11 seed South Carolina in the first round of the tournament in Nashville.

Missouri fans could see the writing on the wall for a bad season when last years’ season ended. The Tigers missed an NCAA Tournament bid, lost in the second round of the NIT to Southern Mississippi, leading (and sometimes only) scorers Jordan Clarkson and Jabari Brown left early for the NBA, and head coach Frank Haith bolted for Tulsa.

Kim Anderson took the Missouri job on April 28th and was left with four scholarship players. So he had a short off season re-recruit Haith commits Jakeenan Gant and Namon Wright as well as find his own recruits: D’Angelo Allen, Tramine Isabell, and Teki Gill-Casear and senior transfer Keith Shamburger. He also had to, you know, install an offense and defense and bring all these players together as a team.

Before the season even started there was drama. Gant and Allen got into an altercation and were suspended from team activities a month before the season. Anderson cleared them, but Gant remained sidelined for the first nine games due to an NCAA violation that was never specified.

Jan 10, 2015; Auburn, AL, USA; Auburn Tigers forward Cinmeon Bowers (5) and forward Alex Thompson (2) pressure Missouri Tigers forward Jonathan Williams, III (3) during the second half at Auburn Arena. Auburn beat Missouri 85-79. Mandatory Credit: John Reed-USA TODAY Sports

Discipline played a role and might have contributed to the dismal season. All five freshmen were disciplined at some point, and missed a total of 17 games between them. In fact, only Shamburger, Jonathan Williams III, Keanau Post, and Ryan Rosburg were the only ones not to be suspended.

Fast forward to November 14th, Missouri’s season opener against University of Missouri-Kansas City. Expectations weren’t sky-high for this team, but most fans would have expected a competitive, maybe NIT or CBI bound later on in the year. Those hopes were all wiped away by the end of the night, yes Missouri, the flagship university of the state lost to instate UMKC, a team from the Western Athletic Conference, 69-61.

That set the tone for an ugly season of basketball. Mizzou went to Hawaii for the prestigious Maui Invitational and got smoked by No.3 at the time Arizona, and didn’t even show up against Purdue.

They returned home and got gimme wins against SEMO, Elon, and Lipscomb but lost against superior opponents Oklahoma, Xavier, Illinois, and Oklahoma State to close out the non-conference season at 6-7, their first losing non-conference season in 34 years.

Then January 8th happened and the Black & Gold solidified themselves as a top SEC team by shocking the world with a win over then 11-2 LSU. The Tigers were undefeated to start 2015, and 1-0 to start SEC play. Mizzou fans dreamed about what their Tigers could do with some momentum under their belt. No one could possibly imagine what would happen over the next 13 games.

January 8th would be the last time Missouri Tigers basketball tasted victory until February 24th. The Tigers embarked on a seven week, yes week, losing streak by losing to a bad Auburn team, and were punching bags the next time out against No.1 and still undefeated Kentucky.

Jan 8, 2015; Columbia, MO, USA; Missouri Tigers guard Namon Wright (12) celebrates in the final seconds of overtime while LSU Tigers guard Tim Quarterman (55) reacts at Mizzou Arena. The Missouri Tigers defeated the LSU Tigers 74-67. Mandatory Credit: Dak Dillon-USA TODAY Sportsweek, yes week, losing streak with a loss to a bad Auburn team and then were punching bags to a No.1 and still undefeated Kentucky team.

They did have some chances to win, but they really struggled to put the ball in the hoop. They averaged 57 points per game while giving up an average of 72. In the 13 game losing streak, there were some close losses against Tennessee, Arkansas, South Carolina and Mississippi State and some really-not-close-at-all losses to Kentucky, Texas A&M (twice) and Vanderbilt. Either way, the fact is the majority of the players were freshmen or sophomores and consistency was a huge issue.

Williams, who was the team’s leading scorer at just over 5 PPG going into the season, had games where he looked like a beast against LSU, Arkansas, and Mississippi State, but looked lost against Kentucky, Alabama, and Vanderbilt.

Wes Clark was suspended for the Oklahoma game earlier in the year, but established himself as a scorer and emotional leader of the team, ironically after he missed two free throws that would have won the game against Arkansas.

All freshmen had their moments and definitely showed glimmers of hope for the future, but could never be all counted on night in and night out.

If Missouri Tigers basketball wasn’t at rock bottom, they certainly hit it on February 10th when they visited South Carolina. This was a rare winnable game for the Tigers despite only dressing eight players due to the suspensions of Isabell, Gill-Casear and Wright. All their hopes went out the window when Clark dove for a lose ball and suffered a very gruesome elbow injury, ending his season. As a result, the Tigers fell 65-60.

Feb 10, 2015; Columbia, SC, USA; Missouri Tigers guard Wes Clark (15) is helped off the court after injuring his arm against the South Carolina Gamecocks in the second half at Colonial Life Arena. Mandatory Credit: Jeff Blake-USA TODAY Sports

On February 21st the Tigers were blown out at Vanderbilt 76-53 and that gave this Missouri team the school record for most consecutive losses at 13. Namon Wright refused to let that streak continue as he scored 28 points on 10-13 shooting against Florida the next time out en route to a 64-52 Tiger victory.

All that matters is that they ended the streak, they may have gotten blown out against Georgia the next game, but it was important not to lose out. That may have cost Anderson his job, and probably would have destroyed the psyche of all these talented freshmen.

On senior night Keith Shamburger dazzled in his last home game against Auburn. The senior scored 21 points and helped the Tigers come back from a nine point deficit late in the game by hitting the game winner with 10 seconds left.

The Tigers book-ended their season with a losses to UMKC in the opener and Mississippi State in the finale. Mizzou stands at 9-22 and are in grave danger of becoming the 11th team to finish with more football wins than basketball wins. It is unlikely they will reach that 11th win as they will need to get by South Carolina on Thursday and Ole Miss, both teams they’ve lost to.

Either way, Year 2 for Anderson will be big for him. In fairness he will have a whole off season to recruit and teach his players, and the roster will be much more experienced. The 2015 recruiting class hasn’t been flashy so far, so there likely won’t be a program changer coming in next year.

That leaves the onus on the coach, and he will definitely need much more than nine wins to get a third year.

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