Butterfield on board at Missouri
The Missouri Tigers didn't have to look all that far to find the latest addition to their 2006 basketball recruiting class. Darryl Butterfield signed with the Tigers after an official visit over the last couple of days.
Advertisement
"I really liked the system at Missouri," Butterfield said in a release from Mineral Area College. "It is a lot like what I played in at MAC. I'm comfortable playing that style and I feel I can excel in that system."
Butterfield's coaches say it is the system that was a major draw for the 6-foot-7 forward.
"Their system is like personally designed for Darryl," said Tate. "He was born to play in this type of system. Darryl will have a good time, have fun in that system and I know he'll work hard."
"Darryl's going to fit in great," said MAC assistant Kyle Gerdeman. "That's the same thing we did. We pressed for 40 minutes, ran for 40 minutes. He's a tremendous athlete, he's a tough minded kid. He has that tough mentality and he's going to live and breathe whatever coach Anderson wants him to do."
Tate said Anderson was the other major reason Butterfield chose to be a Tiger.
"He loved the family atmosphere as far as the environment that Mike Anderson has with his players and his staff," Tate said. "He was real welcomed up there with coach Anderson, felt real at home."
"The thing about Darryl is he understands what he's good at," Gerdeman said. "He's not the type of guy to try to do too much. He enjoys playing hard, enjoys scrapping, he's a good teammate. If that means he's got to set screens all day, that's what he's going to do."
Butterfield is a power forward who should provide the Tigers some depth in a frontcourt that has very little of it at this point. He averaged 8.4 points and 4.9 rebounds as a sophomore for a Mineral Area team that won 28 games a season ago. He joins J.T. Tiller, Keon Lawrence and Vaidatos Volkus in Mike Anderson's first class at Missouri.
Tate was happy to see one of his players heading to Mizzou.
"Always," said the coach. "That school gave me a great start in life so I would love for a kid to have that same experience. I enjoyed my time at the University of Missouri. There's a lot of support up there and all around the state."
The Tigers are still awaiting official word from Vanderbilt transfer DeMarre Carroll and Chipola College point guard Stefhon Hannah.