I'm back, I got a little scared off by the stretch after Mississippi Valley State and the amount of rotations that were used, but I've spent the time and put together the past few games.

I won't include the full rotations through the season, just know that we're up to 188 total this year.

I will also put in the season minutes total for each player and the minutes against kansas as a way to better contextualize, as well as the team's top-10 used rotations.

So the full rundown, rotations vs. kansas, top-10 rotations and season/game individual minutes.

Let's get started.

Alright, the jump-out number here is just how much Gates used the starting 5.

For once, he just left his best players on the court for a long time and it worked. The same 5 started after halftime and were on the floor for at least the first six minutes of both halves, that's by far the most this season.

There were still a number of short-used rotations, but the lineup was very tightened up against kansas and it worked.

It can't happen every game because those guys will wear out over time, but there's a theme to watch out for against big-time opponents.

Just kind of reinforcing what we saw, Tamar Bates, Mark Mitchell and Ant Robinson didn't really come off the floor against kansas.

We've definitely ironed out the main rotation guys in those three, Tony Perkins, Josh Gray, Aidan Shaw and Marques Warrick.

No Caleb Grill has changed the style of the rotations the past few games, they really started getting tightened up against Lindenwood and have been the past two games. I expect we'll get back to a looser look the next couple of games, but by Braggin' Rights, I think this will basically be the rotations we see.

You might notice the most used rotation was the starting 5 against kansas and has the same amount of minutes and appearances together. That's because somehow that was the first time those five key players were on the floor at the same time. Not sure how that took that long.

But the amount they played instantly got them into that top spot.

Second is the starting 5 the Tigers had been going with and got that high mostly from regular usage, though they had been quickly replaced by that third group in a number of games recently as Dennis Gates would bring on Grill to get some shooting onto the floor.

Depending on how long the Tigers have to go without Grill - still no set timeline according to Gates - those second and third groups will fall back, though with how quick I expect subs to be and how much time the bench should get in the next couple of games, they might not be caught by groups 4 and 5.

As we get more than a third of the way into the season, Gates has his guys pretty well ironed out and though he makes a lot of quick changes, it's becoming clearer who those top 8-10 are and they are being used as such, even if a weird T.O. Barrett appearance against kansas makes it feel off.

Stay up to date on all the Mizzou news with your premium subscription

Talk about this story in the story thread and discuss so much more in The Tiger Walk

Make sure you're caught up on all the Tiger news and headlines

You can follow me on X @kyle_mcareavy for more news and updates.