The year is almost over, and you know what that means: Every kiss begins with Kay? … He went to Jared? … The expectation of seeing a new Mercedes with a bow on it in the driveway even though that has never happened to anyone ever?
No, no and no.
It means year-end lists. Who am I to mess with tradition? Or have an original thought?
Before I get to the list, here’s a quick state of the union. By my estimation, 2015 was the worst calendar year in the history of Missouri athletics. I wasn’t around before 1970, and for my first decade I was mostly interested in banging a wooden spoon against my high chair tray, then playing with Hot Wheels, then staring with wonder at Mary Ann from “Gilligan’s Island.” But I still feel confident in saying 2015 was the worst year in Missouri athletic history. It included a 3-15 SEC basketball record, a 1-7 SEC football record, the hire of athletic director Mack Rhoades, the resignation of football coach Gary Pinkel and the protests.
And 2016 was probably the second-worst Mizzou athletic year, marred by more terrible basketball and football, NCAA issues in basketball and a Title IX softball investigation. It was redeemed only by the trade of Rhoades for Jim Sterk.
After those years, the bar for 2017 was low. It hasn’t been a great year, but Missouri finally is out of the wilderness in football and basketball, building a significant football facility and doing well in most nonrevenue sports. And there are still two big events left on the calendar — the Braggin’ Rights game Saturday and the Texas Bowl on Wednesday — which could leave Mizzou fans feeling like 2017 gave them a delicious coconut cream pie whipped up by Mary Ann despite the fact she had no access to eggs, sugar or vanilla extract.
Here are my top eight Mizzou athletics moments of 2017. Everybody else does 10. I get paid the same either way, so I do eight.
8. “STICK IT UP YOUR (BLEEPING) ASS!”: Kim Anderson was officially a lame duck by the time Missouri faced Auburn in the first round of the SEC Tournament. Kevin Puryear’s 3-pointer at the overtime buzzer gave Missouri a thrilling 86-83 upset victory, which was pretty cool. The best part was to come, though. The camera followed Anderson off the floor, and as the SEC Network’s Dari Nowkhah was telling a touching story about Anderson fighting back tears as he coached his alma mater to victory, Anderson was clearly heard screaming to the rafters about where the victory should be stored for posterity.
7: GOING THE DISTANCE: Fast is fast, regardless of weather, as Karissa Schweitzer showed by winning NCAA titles in the indoor and outdoor 5,000-meter run. She went on to fare quite well against the pros, placing fourth in the 5,000 at the USA Track & Field Championships with a school-record time of 15:18.69. That pace is about 5 minutes per mile. Just for an experiment, I went to the gym and set the treadmill at that pace. The rest of the gym assumed the experiment was my attempt at recreating the opening credits of “The Jetsons.”
6. TAKE THAT, ROCK BRIDGE THIRD-TEAM LEFT TACKLE!: By the end of the regular season, Barry Odom’s press conference after the Auburn game (“A guy that's the third-team left tackle from Rock Bridge High School that's got a Twitter account that's got 12 followers and he wants to put out how terrible we are”) and his pyrotechnic performance after the Georgia game had become legendary, at least in the mind of sideline reporters, who couldn’t stop retelling the stories. Coincidentally or not, the Tigers did start playing better after the Auburn game and started winning after the Georgia game. Definitely not coincidentally, @RB3rdTeamLT now has 49 followers.
5. AN AMAZING EVENT THAT SHOULD NEVER, EVER HAPPEN AGAIN: It was just an exhibition fundraiser for storm victims, but when the Missouri and Kansas basketball teams met in Kansas City, it felt like old times. The teams delivered a well-played, spirited game, won by the Jayhawks at the Sprint Center, which had sold out minutes after tickets went on sale. My perception of the excitement before, during and after game was that fans of both teams were having a great time. I learned later from Bill Self that nobody from Kansas had cared at all and there was no particular reason to play again.
4. GOING HOG WILD: The Missouri football team spent the first half of the season getting blown out and the second half of the season blowing out opponents. Only two games were decided by less than 18 points. The highlight was a 48-45 victory at Arkansas in the regular-season finale. The Tigers erased a 21-7 deficit, Drew Lock threw five touchdown passes (giving him an SEC-record 43 for the season) and Tucker McCann hit a 19-yard winning field goal in the final seconds. The Razorbacks were nothing special — Bret Bielema was fired on his way off the field — but Missouri did take a 3-1 series lead over their new rival since joining the SEC. That means the Battle Line Rivalry trophy will remain behind glass in the Mizzou Athletic Training Complex, although Odom really should let Eric Beisel take it out occasionally for chaperoned dates.
3. LET THE GOOD TIMES ROLL: The Missouri women’s basketball program has steadily improved and gathered fans throughout Robin Pingeton’s tenure. The Tigers delivered the biggest moment of the year at Mizzou Arena in 2017 — and the biggest win of Pingeton’s tenure — when they took down eventual national champion South Carolina. With the score tied at 60, Missouri’s home-grown star, Sophie Cunningham, salvaged a deteriorating possession by driving into the lane, freezing the Gamecocks’ 6-foot-5 A’ja Wilson with a pass fake and delivering a finger-roll layup at the buzzer. Afterward, Cunningham said she couldn’t remember much about the play. She has probably watched the clip a few times since to refresh her memory.
2. COX’S CLOSING ARGUMENT: Once you’ve won an Olympic medal, it’s a safe bet that most of the items on your athletic to-do list already have a line through them. J’den Cox headed to St. Louis in March with little left to prove but with an opportunity to do what no Missouri wrestler had ever done — win a third NCAA title. He did just that, beating Minnesota’s Brett Pfarr 8-2 in the 197-pound championship match. Is Cox the greatest athlete in school history? He has my vote.
1. “I’M COMING HOME”: With the tweet that sold 15,000 season tickets, Michael Porter Jr. announced in March that he would be following his father — who had recently accepted a job on new coach Cuonzo Martin’s staff — back to Missouri. The Porter/Martin combination paid immediate dividends, as blue-chip high school recruits Blake Harris, Jeremiah Tilmon and Jontay Porter and graduate transfer Kassius Robertson gave one of the nation’s worst Power 5 programs a top-five class. MPJ accomplished next-to-nothing on the court — so far, at least — because of a back injury, but he shaved years off Martin’s rebuilding job. And for all those folks who bought season tickets to see individual greatness, well, they still get to watch a good team.
