Dennis Gates Makes Mizzou's Case for a Bid in the NCAA Tournament

COLUMBIA,Mo. — Mark Mitchell believes that if you watch the games, you'll see why Missouri is deserving of a spot in the NCAA Tournament.

Even in Missouri's overtime loss to No. 20 Arkansas to close the regular season Saturday, the Tigers looked like a team good enough to compete in the tournament. Huge wins over some of the top teams in the Southeastern Conference — Florida, Kentucky, Texas A&M, Tennessee and Vanderbilt — back that up, too.

"I think we're obviously a tournament team if you look at us" Mitchell said after the loss to Arkansas. "Look at how we played the teams we played, some of the big wins we've had. I think it's pretty obvious."

John Calipari, who knows a thing or two about NCAA Tournament teams, also believes Missouri has done more than enough to earn a spot.

"Obviously an NCAA tournament team and a team that can advance," Calipari said of Missouri after Saturday's game. "My guess is Dennis (Gates) will push them that way."

Missouri is seemingly close to a "lock" to earn a bid. If it does, it will be the third team under Dennis Gates to do so, but the one with the lowest overall record, finishing the regular season at 20-11. Missouri turned around its season at the start of conference play by taking wins over No. 22 Florida and Kentucky.

The only real argument against Missouri is how poor it performed in, non-conference play, where it went 1-3 against power-conference opponents. The Tigers looked dead in the water in their final game of the calendar year, a 43-point loss to No. 18 Illinois.

Gates hopes the committee will recognize the context of the circumstances Missouri was dealing with through December, with forward Trent Pierce missing every non-conference game and guard Jayden Stone missing the six final games of the non-conference slate.

Those two returning from injury completely changed the dynamics of the team, with Pierce averaging 10.6 points and 3.8 rebounds, while Stone averaged 13.8 points and 5.1 rebounds across conference play.

"Our team hadn't started growing and developing until after the new year (when Stone and Pierce returned)," Gates said. "... When you look at it, injuries toward the end of the season will impact somebody's seeding. Some people lost some key players. We gained our key players, and we've played an outstanding style of basketball, and that's what our measurement should be on. When we got 100%, what did our team look like and what did we accomplish?"

Gates specifically pointed to two metrics for Missouri — Quad-1 wins and wins above bubble. Entering Saturday's action, Missouri ranked 28th in the country in record against Quad-1 opponents, and 36th in wins above bubble.

Missouri's SEC slate captures the essence of the conference this season. Florida stands on its own as one of the top teams in the country, while Arkansas is also a dangerous team. After that tier though, there's 8-10 teams that beat up on each other, making it to difficult to evaluate each team individually.

Missouri has wins over some of the top teams in the conference, but also suffered bad losses to some of the conference's worst — LSU and Ole Miss. Missouri's been on both ends of tight games that come down to the wire, winning in the final moments in games against Oklahoma and Florida, but losing ones to Georgia, or against Arkansas on Saturday.

"We had some tough games, lost a couple down probably two or three possessions," Gates said. "...We have some great wins, I'll just leave it up to selection committee, but we have a really good case in this conference."

Out of what could become three Gates' teams at Missouri to earn a NCAA Tournament bid, this one is the most unique. Mainly from the complete turn it took in the right direction after the non-conference schedule. There's bad losses but also undeniable wins. That formula and unpredictability should make for an intriguing postseason team.

"If you said in my (introductory) press conference that I'll go to three out of four NCAA Tournaments, that's a heck of an accomplishment," Gates said. "So we're striving to put our team in that position this year."