Missouri men’s basketball showed similar struggles in both losses against Auburn and Texas A&M, which it will need to improve on before tournament games.

After the shocking game-winning buzzer beater from senior guard DeAndre Gholston against No. 10 Tennessee, Missouri seemed poised for another hot streak. However, its offense came to a screeching halt in recent games.

It’s no secret that Missouri lives and dies by the three ball. The results cannot be argued, as the Tigers are second in 3-point makes in and second in 3-point percentage in the SEC. In both losses, those 3-pointers did not fall. The Tigers shot an abysmal 5-22 from 3 against Auburn, and 9-26 against Texas A&M. Missouri has to get more open looks and move the ball to find the open player on the 3-point line.

That being said, Missouri also has to convert on the free throw line. The Tigers only shot 68.8% on free throws against Texas A&M, which contributed a great deal to the loss.

Junior forward Mohamed Diarra has shown a lot of promise of being a great rebounder — grabbing seven rebounds against Texas A&M — but as a whole, the Tigers are still getting outrebounded by their opponents.

Auburn was able to come away with 16 offensive rebounds compared to Missouri’s seven, and A&M had 16 compared to Missouri’s nine. Losing that amount of offensive rebounds makes things difficult for Missouri, and allows their opponents to get second chance opportunities.

Three-point shooting, free throw conversion and rebounding are all issues Gates and his coaching staff will have to address before the SEC and March Madness tournaments begin in March. If the Tigers want to succeed, they have to hone in on overcoming their weaknesses for the last four regular season games and get back to their winning ways.

Edited by Davis Wilson, dwilson@themaneater.com
Copy edited by Grace Knight