Missouri fans are about to learn a new word. Or at least re-learn one they haven’t used in a while. Let me spell it for you:
T-O-U-R-N-A-M-E-N-T
That’s where Missouri’s headed. And I’m not talking about the SEC Tournament in St. Louis this week, in which the Tigers will be the five seed after a 77-67 win over Arkansas on Saturday. I’m talking about the big one. The one with the four letters before it.
Cuonzo Martin has said Missouri was NCAA Tournament bound for quite some time. He said it with five games to go in the regular season “barring a collapse.” The Tigers followed that up with three straight losses…and many braced for the collapse.
“After our last three game skid we kind of buckled down and we were like, ‘Hey, we’ve got to fix this ship,” Jontay Porter said. “We weren’t constantly checking the (Joe) Lunardi projections or anything, but it was in our head that this was a must-win.”
The Tigers won two after that, on the road at Vanderbilt and then at home against the Razorbacks. They’ve won 20 games and they’re going to the NCAA Tournament. The only questions now are where they’ll play, who they’ll play and what number will be next to their name.
Twelve months ago, even Martin didn’t see it coming.
“No, not with the roster we had returning,” Martin said. “Just the mental piece that we had to train and develop. We’ll get to the court at some point, but we’ve got to get the mind right. To understand that that was just a part of it, that was in the past. There were games early in the season, I looked in their eyes and it just wasn’t there.”
Losing takes a toll. On everybody. Jordan Barnett is one of five holdovers from the Kim Anderson era in Martin’s eight-man (now, at least temporarily, seven after Cullen VanLeer tore his ACL on Saturday) rotation. He wasn’t around for all of the losing…but he was around for enough.
“I mean, this is a team that went 8-and-24 last year and was 10-and-21 the year before that and I think 9-and-23 the year before that,” Barnett said, laying all the hideousness out there for everyone to hear. “This is a team and a group of fans that have seen the struggle. To come out this season and just to get our 20th win means a lot, but obviously we’re not done.”
And to appreciate where this team is going, you really have to know from where it came. Missouri went 28-and-67 over the last three seasons. It won eight Southeastern Conference games…total. The only postseason discussion it was involved in was, “Who’s the worst Power Five team in the country?”
That’s what Martin walked into. And even he didn’t really appreciate the depth of the hole from which his program had to emerge.
“I never understood the emotional fatigue or letdown when you struggle in a program, you lose for so long,” Martin said. “I had to change my approach as a coach and have more compassion where I should have drove a guy and just understand that. I grew up a lot as a coach because I’ve never been around that.
“There was a lot of things behind the scenes. Roller-coaster ride.”
And, yeah, the Tigers hired Michael Porter Sr., which led to the commitment of Michael Porter Jr. and Jontay Porter. And Martin flipped Jeremiah Tilmon. And then added Kassius Robertson, a grad transfer from Canisius. But even then, Martin didn’t dare to dream of a turnaround this rapid.
“Even with Mike and those guys, it’s so hard,” Martin said. “They’re all my players. They’re all the same to me. I don’t care what status level or stars. I never got caught up in that. Just, again, the work they put in…”
Mike is obviously Porter Jr., who exited the court after two minutes for an operating table, thus far not to return. And then C.J. Roberts transferred. And Blake Harris transferred. And Terrence Phillips was off the team. And Missouri lost three straight games. They won a few and then lost three straight again.
And through it all, they perservered.
“I always remain optimistic, so yeah, I expected a turnaround,” Barnett said. “It’s just a really close team. Everybody loves everybody, we love being around each other. It’s a really good group of guys.”
“It’s been amazing what this team’s done despite losing the best player in the country,” Jontay Porter said. “It’s been crazy how we’ve stuck together despite everyone saying we’re not gonna do anything without Mike. It’s been awesome.”
The reward—even if they won’t admit to it—is an NCAA Tournament bid that they locked up in front of the type of crowd that had ceased to exist in Columbia through the desert of the last three seasons.
“I’m not thinking about it yet because I don’t want to jinx anything,” Kassius Robertson said. “I’m trying to win the SEC Tournament so there’s no indecision.”
One game at a time is all good. And, sure, Missouri wants more. And maybe they can get more. Because when the Tigers are good, they’re really good.
“We have enough to be as good as anybody, as long as we’re like this,” Martin said, clenching his hands together to symbolize togetherness.
But sometimes, you’ve got to stop and smell the roses. The ones that grew out of three years of ashes and were fostered by a nomad coach trying to prove he never should have been booted from the SEC. That got a ray of sunlight from a 6-11 kid who should be a celebrating Senior Night at Tolton High School and another who was headed to Illinois. That have been protected from the storms by a one-and-done player from the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference and a senior who is finally playing the way everyone thought he could when he hung 43 points as a high school senior in the state tournament in this gym.
“This is what it’s about. This is what this University has been about when it comes to basketball,” Martin said. “I told them, twenty years down the road, you’ll be the guys that did whatever it was.”
So, yeah, stop and smell the roses that finally, on a sunny Saturday in March, fully blossomed…making the rest of the month once again meaningful at Mizzou.
