There is no good way to explain the type of season that Missouri had. It wasn’t just a bad year — it was a historically disappointing one.
There were signs early on that the Tigers were due to run into trouble. There was the team’s second-half collapse at home against Memphis in the second game of the season. There was the scare against Minnesota in which Mizzou had to rally from being down 20 points to come out with a win. MU suffered its most embarrassing loss in the next game, getting beat by Jackson State at home, 73-72. South Carolina State got off to a 16-point lead in the team’s next outing before the black and gold seemed to regroup and rattle off four wins in a row, including victories against Pitt and Wichita State.
Sitting at 7-2, the team appeared to be a flawed group, but one that was beginning to improve. That changed when graduate senior guard Caleb Grill suffered a fractured wrist that required surgery to repair, an ailment that would knock him out for the season. Head coach Dennis Gates described the injury as “the straw that broke the camel’s back.”
The Tigers would go on to lose 22 of their next 23 games, including all 19 of their matchups against SEC opponents. They came into the year knowing they’d struggle to be a top-10 offense like they were in the 2022-23 season, but hoped to make up the gap by taking strides forward on the defensive end. Instead, the team took a step backward in both regards, finishing the season ranked 135th in KenPom’s adjusted offensive efficiency and 185 in defensive rating.
Missouri ended the year with just three victories against non-Quad 4 teams in the NET ratings. But it was also a team that could never catch a break health-wise.
“We've had to change a lot because of our injuries,” Gates said “We beat some teams but it allowed us to galvanize and be consistent. Once that injury took place, we had to move so many different parts and ask guys to do different things and we just wouldn't able to settle in on the traditional rotations what we started out with in June.”
Nobody from Mizzou is happy about the team’s record. For some of the Tigers’ players and coaches, it was their first time experiencing a losing season.
One of those players was junior guard Tamar Bates, who transferred to Missouri after spending his two years at Indiana. Losing as many games as the Tigers did wears on everybody. But Bates believes it brought the players closer together.
“The main thing I'm taking away is just the relationships, the camaraderie that we built,” Bates said. “You know, these are lifelong relationships. Like, these are literally brothers for life. You know, you can't fake these types of relationships and the type of things that we went through. Because a lot of teams, they're bonded through success. But we're bonded through a certain type of pain. We knew we could have been on the other side of a lot of those games in conference, we just came up short.”
Bates also believes the adversity the players faced this year will only make them stronger moving forward, especially those who stick with the Tigers. The Kansas City, Kan. native said he intends to go through his typical offseason process, putting some consideration into what all of his options are when it comes to where he’ll play next season, but feels fairly confident he’ll remain with Mizzou.
“It's definitely something I'm gonna think a little bit more about. I mean, it's not that I'm — like, I'm not going anywhere. But you know, just in terms of, what we do after the season, and this spring, whether that's testing the waters or whatever. But there's, like, no doubt that I'm coming back. Yeah, I would never leave, especially after, like I said, these relationships are real. And you know, we're gonna definitely have something to prove. So I'll 100% be back.”
The 6-foot-5 guard said he expects next year’s returners to be fueled like no other team — “If something like this doesn't motivate you then, I mean, there's nothing else that needs to be said.”
But to get the program back on track next season, the black and gold’s newcomers will need to match that drive. Bates knows MU is set to bring in the No. 4 signing class in the 2024 cycle. He also knows that the additions Gates brings in from the transfer portal will be crucial in how things play out.
Bates averaged a career-high of 13.5 points per game on extremely efficient shooting splits of 49.5% from the field, 38.5% from the 3-point line and 92.6% from the free throw line. It didn’t translate into the wins he and the rest of the Tigers were hoping for. But a bounce back might not be too far away.
With next season being his final year of eligibility, Bates is hoping to make it count.
“We just gotta, obviously, get the right pieces,” Bates said. “We've got a good class coming in and, in terms of the transfer portal, you know, we'll all be in communication with the coaches in who we think fits our culture and our style of play. But I mean, it just comes down to, you know, guys who are going to be willing to win and then kind of inherit the pain that we went through last year and the sense of urgency that we'll have approaching this next season.”
Stay up to date on all the Mizzou news with your premium subscription
Talk about this story and more in The Tigers' Lair
Make sure you're caught up on all the Tiger news and headlines
Subscribe to our YouTube Channel for video and live streaming coverage
