After losing at the Mizzou Arena for the first time this season, No. 21 Missouri will try to restore its home competence advantage when it meets Oklahoma on Wednesday.
The tigers (17-6, 6-4 Southeastern Conference) were 15-0 at home before they fell to then no. 10 Texas A&M 67-64 on Saturday. It was Missouri’s second straight loss in total, after an 85-81 setback at then no. 4 Tennessee on February 5th.
These defeat lost Missouri six places from No. 15 in the latest Press Top 25 survey.
“The ironic with this conference: you can play well and still lose a game,” said Missouri coach Dennis Gates. “It’s so good this conference is. We lost our last two matches with a total of seven points to two top-10 teams. One in a final second shot, last second 3.
“How much better do you want our guys to play?”
Missouri left a lot of room for improvements to aggies. The Jacob crews made 3 out of 4 shots from 3-point reach that came from the bench, but his teammates combined to miss 15 of 17 shots behind the bow.
The tigers are on average nine 3 points per match this season. Caleb Grill shoots almost 47.7 percent (51-AV-103) from Long Distance, but he held him to 0-for-4-shooting on 3-point attempts.
“Caleb could get a couple of looks, and these appearance did not fall down,” Gates said. “He shot four triangles, and I think all four of these three were wide open. But the seriousness that Caleb Grill played and was on the court was more important than the point.
“He distributed the court for Tamar (Bates). He extended to the court for the crews to be able to drive, in addition to Marques Warrick, besides Tony Perkins. So these things helped our crime, him in court.”
Bates leads Missouri in points at 14.0 points per match. Grill (12.6) and Mark Mitchell (12.3) are also on average in double numbers.
The Sooners (16-7, 3-7 sec) come from two inclined losses to top 5 teams. They fell 98-70 at No. 1 Auburn on February 4 and 70-52 at home against the then no. 4 Tennessee on Saturday.
After a strong nonconference that showed that included victories over two ranked teams, Sooners has struggled in league games.
“I thought that what we did earlier in the year that we are not doing right now is emotionally and physically struggles through difficult times in a game,” said Oklahoma coach Porter Moser.
“I thought this team was really resistant. I talked to you after a number of close games that we won, whether it was Providence, Arizona, Michigan, Louisville, just over and over. We were down at half time (against) Georgia Tech. … we were down (against) Arkansas.
Jalen Moore leads Oklahoma with 17.7 points and 5.7 returns per match. Jeremiah fears an average of 15.5 points and 4.0 assists, while Duke Miles contributes 10.3 points per competition.
After suffering from a thigh injury against Auburn, fear was hesitant to meet Tennessee. But he made his 20th row and got eight points in 28 minutes.
“He hadn’t had any reps for the past two days,” Moser said after the match. “He knocked it out and really tried to be there for his teammates to play in this big game.”
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