In ESPN Bracketologist Joe Lunardi’s latest projections, Missouri — which exited the AP Top 25 and are losers of four of its last five games — is in.
That’s the good news for the Tigers. The bad news? Missouri is projected to be an eight seed. If the Tigers win their first-round matchup, they’re projected to face the vaunted Gonzaga Bulldogs at the tail end of the NCAA Tournament’s first weekend.
No. 1 Gonzaga hasn’t lost yet this season, has defeated three top-13 teams and is the projected No. 1 overall seed.
Luckily for Missouri, there’s an easy solution to this problem: win the final two games of the regular season — Wednesday at Florida and Saturday against LSU — and any potential date with Gonzaga likely waits until at least the Sweet 16.
“We talk about [bracket projections], just in ways to make them better understand the task at hand,” Missouri coach Cuonzo Martin said. “Not to add any added pressures. And then, oftentimes, I pull certain guys to the side … to be able to relay certain things to his teammates. So yes, do we talk about all that? Yes.”
The Tigers enter the final week of the regular season in a slump, shooting a dreadful 35% in its latest loss to Ole Miss. Many came on wide-open looks, but they just didn’t fall.
Martin will live with the issue of missed shots, calling them “missues.” But he won’t live with the team falling back into the bad defensive habits that caused the rough stretch.
“It’s not as if you’re adding a lot of new things this time of year,” Martin said. “It’s not as if you’re adding more guys to the roster. So you know who you are, you know what makes you successful, so it’s understanding what makes me successful as an individual player and what makes us successful as a team.”
For those optimistic the Tigers can get back on the right track, the recent weekend off might be a source of hope. Missouri had its recent tilt with Texas A&M postponed due to COVID-19 issues within the Aggies’ program, so the Tigers haven’t played since the Ole Miss loss.
“Yeah, most definitely [it helps], especially after the last two weeks we’ve had,” junior guard Torrence Watson said.
The last time Missouri received extended time off, the subsequent game didn’t go so well, as Tennessee waltzed into Mizzou Arena and blew the Tigers out. But as with bye weeks in football, struggling teams will use extended time off to clear their heads.
“Mental errors [should be where the focus is],” forward Kobe Brown said. “I feel like we need to take care of the mental lapses, turnovers, just the mess-ups that we got.”
If Missouri turns it around in time to make a run in the Tournament, it has to start with tough tests against Florida and LSU. The Gators come in as the third-highest ranked SEC team in the AP Poll behind No. 8 Alabama and No. 11 Arkansas, if the rankings extended that far.
Florida lost star forward Keyontae Johnson Dec. 12 after he collapsed on the court against Florida State. By all accounts, Johnson is doing well, but he won’t play for the rest of the season.
The Gators have stayed close to the top of the SEC standings with strong team defense, as well as guard Tre Mann becoming a do-it-all player.
They also mix up their defensive schemes well, sometimes going with a press and sometimes going with a matchup zone, per Martin.
“They’ve done a good job,” Martin said. “Just getting rebounds, forcing teams to do things I guess you don’t want to do and making it a half-court game.”
LSU is right with Florida at 10-6 in-conference and 15-8 overall. The Bayou Bengals are the second-highest-scoring team in the SEC.
Fortunately for the Tigers, beating good teams has not been their problem this season. Missouri is 6-4 in Quadrant-1 games, which is tied for the fourth-best record in the country. Both Florida and LSU will be Quad-1 games.
Missouri has struggled this season with playing down to its competition. That won’t be a problem this week, starting with the Florida game tonight at 5:30.
_Edited by Kyle Pinnell | kpinnell@themaneater.com_