For fans waiting on a blowout, Thursday night was the night.

The Missouri Tigers tied the program record for margin of victory at 72 points in a 111-39 win against the Mississippi Valley State Delta Devils at Mizzou Arena.

It was the third time Missouri has reached a 72-point victory, allowing with a 117-45 win against Chicago State on Dec. 2, 1995 and a 106-34 win against MacMurray on Jan. 12, 1976.

“We don’t go out there to try to break records like that,” Missouri coach Dennis Gates said. “But I thought our guys didn’t turn the ball over, they were able to get to the free-throw line and we knocked down 15 3s.”

The Tigers also set Gates-era records in points scored, beating the 105 they scored against SIU-Edwardsville (Nov. 15, 2022) and Houston Christian (Nov. 26, 2022) and points allowed, beating the 50 they allowed against SIU-Edwardsville last year (Nov. 13, 2023).

The Tiger half-court offense started slowly with their first two possessions of the game ending with either a shot-clock violation or a heave at the buzzer, but once it got rolling, Missouri never stopped.

Josh Gray kicked the ball out of the paint to Tamar Bates for a right-corner 3 to put Missouri in front for good at 3-2 with 18:27 left in the first half.

Anthony Robinson then turned a chase-down steal into an outlet pass to Bates, who then dished to Annor Boateng for a transition layup to make it 7-2.

Marques Warrick then came off the bench and immediately hit two 3-pointers, the second on the right wing to make it 17-4 with 13:39 left.

“I’ve been doing those things for years now,” Warrick said. “Coming here, coach Gates gave me that green light from the recruiting process, basically, … since Day 1, he’s told me, just let it fly whenever you’re open.”

The offense kept rolling as Gates mixed up his lineup, Jacob Crews faked a swing to Caleb Grill in the corner to open space for a right-wing 3 to make it 37-11, giving Missouri a 13-3 run at the 7:24 mark of the first half.

And the offense just kept rolling as Josh Gray pulled down an easy offensive rebound and kicked it out to Grill, who swung an assist to Bates for a 3 from the top of the key to create a 44-13 margin.

Trent Pierce added a layup and Peyton Marshall hit a free throw for his first career point and send Missouri into halftime up 51-19.

The second half was more of the same as Bates connected on a layup and Robinson worked his way around the paint for a tough layup to make it 56-19 at the 19:18 mark of the second half.

Missouri just kept adding on from there as seven Tigers ended in double figures.

Warrick led the way with 16 points, shooting 6-of-10 overall and 4-of-5 from 3.

Bates and Grill both had 15 as Grill followed up his career-high 33 to beat Eastern Washington on Monday with a 2-of-4 shooting night from 3.

Mitchell scored 13 points and hit two 3-pointers in the second half, Crews added 11 with three 3s and Boateng reached double-digits for the first time with a 10-point night.

“It’s great, seeing everybody get to eat like that is amazing,” Crews said. “There’s no jealousy or anything like that. Everybody is just happy for everyone.”

Aidan Shaw led the team with six rebounds, though he played only nine minutes, and Gates sent out a lineup of only underclassmen late in the first half with true freshmen Boateng, Marshall and Marcus Allen sharing the floor with sophomores Pierce and Robinson.

“They’ve practiced that team together for the entire summer and fall, and they’ve done a tremendous job,” Gates said. “So I just think when you make sure these guys have experience, no matter who starts, no matter who’s in, they just got to be ready to get these reps.”

The Tigers had 19 assists to five turnovers, scored 66 bench points and 44 points in the paint.

They forced 23 turnovers and scored 45 points off of them, scored an incredible 1.609 points per possession and grabbed 18 offensive rebounds for 21 second-chance points.

The only thing to criticize was a 22-of-35 (62.9 percent) day at the free-throw line.

“I love the free-throw attempts, I don’t like the execution on the free-throw line,” Gates said. “Trent Pierce cannot go 4-for-7, Mark Mitchell went 3-for-6, Annor Boateng went 4-for-6. We had Caleb Grill go 5-for-5, which was great, Aidan Shaw went 0-for-2, Peyton Marshall, 1-for-4, those guys need to execute on that line because it does give you confidence. You never know what you can do after seeing the ball go in twice.”

Every scholarship player who played scored a point, missing only freshmen Trent Burns and T.O. Barrett, while walk-ons JV Brown and Jeremy Sanchez both played the final two minutes.

Missouri (3-1) will return to the court at Mizzou Arena on Friday when it hosts Pacific at 6:30 p.m.

Head on over to the Tiger Walk to discuss the game and so much more.