As the clock ticks down on Missouri's 2009-10 basketball season, it is time for a quick review of the Tiger's season.
A couple of losses early to Richmond and Vanderbilt were offset with a win in St. Louis against Illinois, the first Mizzou win in the river rivalry in a decade.
The Big 12 season went better than I expected, especially for such a young and inexperienced team. Beating Texas and K-State at home were bonuses; but the A&M loss was snatched from victory. The two losses to KU were predictable. The loss to Nebraska wasn't. And the loss of Safford late in the season didn't help.
MU played a great game against Clemson in the first round of the Big Dance, but came up short against Bob Huggan's Mountaineers in Round 2. The Tigers battled but just didn't get the ball in the hole, which I attribute to tired legs. They "uglied" up the game just enough to give their long-suffering fans a slight measure of hope when they got it to 3 points just inside the 4-minute mark and again when they got it to 55-59 at just over 2 minutes; then give up a board on a missed free throw and go down by seven in the blink of an eye. A couple of misses, a charge here, a put back there, and down goes Missouri.
BUT Missouri didn't wreck my bracket picks. Kansas did.
Missouri wasn't expected to do much, not as one of the last teams into the tournament. KU, on the other hand, was the top #1 seed, having ridden atop the polls for much of the year. Any win after the first round would have been a bonus for Missouri. Any loss short of the national title was what Kansas and their fans expected.
Must be great to have that kind of confidence.
