When Tennessee forward Grant Williams got whistled for a foul with just more than six minutes remaining in the No. 3 Volunteers’ matchup at Missouri on Tuesday, Williams shook his head as he walked to the bench. Williams’ fifth foul capped a frustrating night for the reigning SEC Player of the Year, who entered the contest averaging 19.9 points and 8.3 rebounds per game. Tuesday, he scored four points and grabbed one rebound in 22 minutes before fouling out.
Missouri not only succeeded in frustrating Williams. The Tigers also held the Volunteers’ second-leading scorer, shooting guard Admiral Schofield, to three points in the first half. On paper, that should have been the formula for beating the Volunteers — or at least slowing down their potent offense. Williams and Schofield have combined to average 38.1 points per game this year. But while Williams’ demeanor as he left the floor might not have shown it, Tennessee handled Missouri anyway. On a night when both teams saw their shooting guards struggle early and their star post players severely limited by foul trouble, the Tennessee role players out-classed Missouri’s, leading to an 87-63 rout.
“Holding (Williams) one-for-eight, it just shows you the level of team that they have to be able to score 83 points, (shoot) 53 percent from the field, still win the game with him being in foul trouble,” Missouri head coach Cuonzo Martin said of the Volunteers.
Tennessee head coach Rick Barnes said the Tigers, fresh off a nine-day layoff, “came out and punched us early.” Missouri channeled the energy of the home crowd and led for nearly all of the game’s first 15 minutes. But trouble actually started brewing for the Tigers just 2:15 into the game, when sophomore forward Jeremiah Tilmon got whistled for a charge. After the play, Tilmon lobbed the basketball at Tennessee center Kyle Alexander, which earned him a technical foul as well. The two fouls sent him to the bench for the remainder of the first half. Mark Smith, Missouri’s leading scorer entering the game, also earned two fouls in the first six minutes, so he spent most of the first half on the bench and didn’t score a point in the half.
Eventually, Missouri’s energy ebbed, and with both Tilmon and Smith on the bench, the Tiger offense began to falter. At the same time, Tennessee, minus both Schofield and Williams, hit its stride. After Kevin Puryear threw down a dunk to give Missouri a nine-point lead with just over seven minutes left in the first half, Tennessee, led by its two point guards, Jordan Bone and Lamonte Turner, went on a 13-0 run. Missouri, meanwhile, failed to make another field goal for the remainder of the half. The Volunteers outscored Missouri 24-4 in the final 7:04 of the first half, and the game was never really in doubt afterward.
Tuesday’s statistics show why Missouri’s leading scorers, and especially Tilmon, have been so key to the team’s success this season. Behind them, there’s not a lot of depth. Tilmon never did establish himself, eventually fouling out in just nine minutes of playing time. Reed Nikko, who shouldered most of the burden at center without Tilmon, scored two points, had zero rebounds and committed three turnovers in 15 minutes of playing time. Freshman wing Torrence Watson scored one point in 26 minutes. Puryear, a four-year starter, contributed nine points and five rebounds, but looked overmatched at times on the offensive end.
Compare that to the numbers of Tennessee’s “other guys:” Bone played a near-flawless 35 minutes, scoring 17 points, grabbing five rebounds and dishing out five assists, all without turning the ball over. Wing Jordan Bowden scored 20 points on seven-of-12 shooting. Alexander added 14 points and grabbed a whopping 17 rebounds.
Tuesday’s game underscored the fact that the Tigers simply don’t have enough talent to compete with the No. 3 team in the country without two of their best scorers. Martin essentially said as much after game, saying the team’s poor finish to the first half resulted from some reserves having to play more than they were used to.
“We had some guys that played some extended minutes and they get fatigued and all of a sudden it shows on both sides of the ball,” Martin said. “I think that was the start of (the Tennessee run).”
Barnes agreed that Tilmon’s absence loomed large in his team’s strong finish to the first half.
“I think you can go back to Tilmon’s fouls,” he said. “That changed for sure what they wanted with our team.”
Barnes was effusive in his praise for how Missouri defended Williams. He credited the Tiger defense, more so than foul trouble, for Williams’ tough night. But while Missouri may be able to take some solace in holding Williams to his season low in both points and rebounds, Tuesday proved that Missouri needs to both execute its defensive gameplan and get its stars, particularly Tilmon, engaged on the offensive end of the floor if it’s going to compete with the class of the SEC. The Tigers simply don’t have enough depth to settle for one or the other.
TURNING POINT: With 7:04 remaining in the first half, Geist hit Puryear with a no-look pass and Puryear finished the play with a dunk. That brought the fans in Mizzou Arena to their feet and extended Missouri’s lead to seven points. Suddenly, the Tigers stopped scoring. Missouri didn’t score another field goal in the first half, and the Volunteers closed the half on a 24-4 run, including scoring the last eight points of the half. The Tigers trailed by 11 points at the break, and the score never got within single digits afterward.
IT WAS OVER WHEN: Tennessee slowly expanded its lead during the first few minutes of the second half, but Missouri was able to cut its deficit to 16 points with a Smith three and a Puryear dunk. Then the Tigers went nearly four minutes without scoring and Tennessee scored seven straight points in that span to effectively put the game out of reach.
CAUSE FOR OPTIMISM: Entering the game, conventional wisdom seemed to indicate that the way to beat Tennessee would be to shut down Williams. Missouri succeeded in doing that. Unfortunately for the Tigers, though, they couldn’t stop the Volunteers’ other offensive weapons.
CAUSE FOR CONCERN: Tilmon has now gotten himself into foul trouble against back-to-back opponents. Perhaps more concerning, Tuesday’s issues resulted more from failing to contain his emotions than anything Tennessee threw at him. That’s something Missouri fans might have seen from freshman Tilmon — and something he admitted to working on improving all offseason. Tilmon’s performances against Xavier and Illinois might have inspired hope that he had turned a corner in his fouling habits, but clearly he’s not there yet.
STOCK UP: K.J. Santos. Prior to this game, Santos had played just X minutes across three games all season due to a preseason foot injury. But he actually gave the Tigers some productive minutes, scoring seven points and hitting his first three-pointer in a Tiger uniform. Due to its lack of depth on the interior, Martin would surely like to see Santos continue to develop into a more consistent offensive threat.
STOCK DOWN: Mitchell Smith. In a game in which Tilmon played just nine minutes and Missouri desperately needed an offensive threat in the post, Smith hardly played. He didn’t enter the game until less than five minutes remained, at which point Missouri trailed by 18. Clearly, he’s been passed by Nikko and Santos in the pecking order.
UP NEXT: Missouri (9-4, KenPom No. 86) will travel to South Carolina (7-7, KenPom No. 115) for a noon tip on Saturday.
