Missouri’s loss at LSU over the weekend offered ample material for frustration. One rich vein is the debate over when the Tigers missed opportunities to turn the momentum in the 78-78 loss, costing MU a chance to move atop the SEC standings.
It’s easy to gripe about Mizzou’s starting five – and its general approach to the opening minutes inside a relatively sedate Pete Maravich Assembly Center. You could also quibble with coach Dennis Gates to swap in Shawn Phillips Jr. for Trent Burns after the Tigers whittled LSU’s lead to three with roughly nine minutes left.
Yet the more subtle moment came and went midway through the first half.
After falling into an early 10-0 hole, the Tigers’ reserve units had gone on a plodding 7-0 spurt over three minutes. During that stretch, Gates rolled a lineup studded with deep reserves: T.O. Barrett, Jayden Stone, Annor Boateng, Trent Pierce and Nicholas Randall. Does that quintet lack offensive potency? Yes, but its job is to buy time before a media timeout so headliners can steal a longer break.
That moment seemingly arrived with 11:56 remaining in the first half. Pierce hacked Marquel Sutton on a dump-off to the short corner. The ensuing free throws offered Gates an organic chance to send Anthony Robinson, Jacob Crews, and Mark Mitchell back into action.
Except Gates didn’t. He rolled with the same lineup for another two minutes. What happened? The Bayo Bengals popped off an 8-2 run, forcing MU’s gates to burn a 30-second timeout to halt the momentum.
Admittedly, it wasn’t the highest-leverage moment of the afternoon, but it best embodied a performance where everybody on MU’s bench seemed slow to react or slightly disengaged. On another day, Mizzou might have escaped with a few scrapes. Instead, for a second consecutive Saturday, the Tigers squandered a prime opportunity against an opponent fighting to salvage its season.
Finding the day’s inflection points isn’t a challenge when looking back over the substitution pattern, either.
For efficiency’s sake, I’ll turn to trusty bullet points and walk us back through them.
- Poor Start: Missouri’s choice to use Phillips as a connector was always going to be delicate, and LSU compounded the issue by jamming off-ball cutters and sinking into gaps. Possessions bogged down into late-clock looks. Defensively, MU’s first-shot coverage mostly held, but weak rebounding allowed LSU to score seven of its first 10 points on second chances.
- Deep Reserves Go Too Long: Re-inserting key pieces didn’t snap MU out of it. Instead, the Tigers coughed up three turnovers in 88 seconds. At the same time, LSU cracked the zone just enough to hit a pair of threes and stretch the lead back to 25–16 with 5:30 left in the half.
- MU Makes Its Move: When Trent Burns checked in with 14:52 left, MU trailed by nine. Over the next five minutes, the Tigers chipped away to 55–52. The formula wasn’t fancy: Burns anchored the zone, Barrett and Stone applied pressure up top, and Crews and Pierce added length on the wings. Offensively, MU finally found rhythm through empty-side ball screens, high PNRs, and Spain actions. Barrett’s free throws with 8:59 left cut the margin to three.
- Subbing During the Run: After those freebies, Gates sat Burns and reinserted Phillips as the backline anchor. The switch coincided with LSU answering with a 12–5 spurt that reasserted control.
Now, it was easy to harangue Gates for parking Burns. But upon the rewatch, I’m not sure you can lay culpability at Phillips’ feet. Yes, he did allow Pablo Tamba to score easily on a post-up. Yet LSU started its riposte on a runout by Sutton, and Pierce was a tick late rotating back. Crews bit on a shot fake to fly by Max Mackinnon for a three-pointer. And the run was capped by Robinson getting screened at the top of the zone, letting King drive a floater to make it 67-57.
Had MU done the boring work of grabbing rebounds and valuing the ball, the 14-7 run that applied game pressure might have been the one that put LSU away. Instead, the Bayou Bengals ended the day plus-9 in net possessions and took 13 more shots from the floor. That’s more than enough to get you beat on the road.
Lineup performances mirrored the game flow as well.
MU’s starting five was swamped, finishing at minus-7 for the day. The deep reserves caught out in the first half posted a minus-4 margin for the day. The platoon that tried to mount a rally landed at plus-6. And finally, the group that let the momentum slip came in at a minus-5 mark.
Here’s another frustrating way to look at the day: Stripping out the three lineups that finished deep in the red leaves MU at plus-8 in 27:46 of action. Put another way, MU controlled this game for long stretches, but the starting lineup and two key substitution decisions made it worthless.
Does that excuse the guys who were on Dale Brown Court? Not in the slightest. But when opting to play at a slower tempo and with a more conservative defensive approach, variance gets magnified – and with it the value of every possession. Players deserve critiques for poor performances, but the guys in suits are paid to make tweaks that mitigate the worst effects.
Unfortunately, they didn’t act decisively enough against LSU.
It’ll come as little surprise that the position performance table reflects lots of Tigers mired in the black.
Again, I expect Phillips’ minus-11 to be a sore spot. You can tick off a litany of gripes. He came up empty on three defense rebounds, which LSU turned into six points. There was the easy post-up bucket for Miller during LSU’s decisive run. In the first half, he needlessly fouled Pablo Tamba on a post-up, gifting him two free throws. Offensively, Phillips committed a turnover while pivoting on a post-up.
However, Phillips didn’t coerce the staff into spending the opening four minutes of the second half trying to play through him on the block, an effort that likely led to a couple of turnovers. I doubt he suggested that they use him as a connector and reader in triangle-based sets to start the game, either.
Hindsight invites speculation about whether Missouri should have leaned harder into its shooting gravity. Three Tigers shoot better than 40 percent from deep, and using them as screeners — via Spain pick-and-rolls, ghost actions out of zipper, or cuts into high ball screens — might have stressed LSU’s off-ball switching. Asking guards, not bigs, to handle those exchanges changes the math. If Crews pops after setting a high screen, does his defender stick with Robinson? If so, that’s an easy kickout. If he recovers, Robinson likely finds a clean driving lane through the middle.
We’re starting to see a familiar vulnerability with the version of MU that emerged from Christmas break: narrow margins when it drifts from best practices.
Like we’ve noted, there’s some wisdom in trying to play at a controlled pace, protect the paint, and rely on precision over chaos. But it magnifies the value of every trip down the floor. LSU’s execution wasn’t pristine, but McMahon’s crew brought more energy to the boards and intensity on the defensive end. And it capitalized when MU left points there for the taking.
By now, we know it’s unlikely MU drastically overhauls its rotation. The task now is optimization, finding ways to get its best players touches and avoiding vulnerable lineups that stall out offensively. The Tigers didn’t need perfection on Saturday. They needed diligence on the floor and vigilance on the sidelines.
The margins are thin enough, and Saturday was another reminder of what happens when they evaporate.