Mizzou Minute: Tigers Men's Basketball Begins Last Stretch of Season with New Mindset
The Missouri Tigers men's basketball team's journey through SEC play has been anything but easy. Through nine conference games, Missouri is still searching for a conference win. Last week, the Tigers continued their skid against (11-11, 2-7) Arkansas at home and (6-16, 1-8) Vanderbilt on the road.
Following the team's loss to Arkansas last Wednesday, head coach Dennis Gates became passionate when speaking about the execution he expects from his team with their backs against the wall.
This week, the Tigers will have two home games, first against Texas A&M on Wednesday and then Mississippi State on Saturday night. Missouri's performance against Texas A&M on January 23 was one of the Tigers' worst performances of the season thus far. After jumping out to a 13-4 lead in the opening minutes, Missouri had scoring droughts of five and six minutes in the middle of the first quarter that they were unable to recover from. One of Texas A&M's biggest strengths is their ability on the boards. They are currently second in the conference with 43.4 rebounds per game. In their match against Missouri, the Aggies won the battle on the glass 41-to-35.
Through their nine straight losses, Missouri has been unable to find consistent production through all 40 minutes. Outside of Sean East II and Tamar Bates, not many players on the roster have shown much scoring ability. East currently leads the team with 15.6 points per game.
Wednesday's match against Texas A&M will be the first of Missouri's last nine chances to turn the 2023-'24 season around before closing out the season in LSU on March 9.
