SB Nation User Blog: Michael Atchison

The One Where Bill Self Gets Feisty

Michael Atchison — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 18:57:36 -0000

The One Where Bill Self Gets Feisty

Can't say that I blame Bill for the reaction, inasmuch as he lives in the post-Eustachy world.

Wayman Tisdale succumbs to cancer

Michael Atchison — Fri, 15 May 2009 17:18:02 -0000

Wayman Tisdale succumbs to cancer

One of the greatest players ever to visit the Hearnes Center has passed at age 44.

There needs to be a Missouri-Kansas version of this ad.

Michael Atchison — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 01:22:04 -0000

There needs to be a Missouri-Kansas version of this ad.

Thomas and Appleton Leaving Kansas

Michael Atchison — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 21:36:30 -0000

Thomas and Appleton Leaving Kansas

As recruiting season hits the home stretch, two scholarships come open.

Mizzou Hoops History Slide Show

Michael Atchison — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 14:28:07 -0000

Courtesy of MizzouWire. Enjoy.

We Can Be Heroes

Michael Atchison — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 18:46:11 -0000

This isn't going to be my normal fare. I'm not going to wax poetic or eloquent, and I'm not going to go back and edit and shape this into a museum piece. I'm just going to pour it onto the page, because that's what these Missouri Tigers make me want to do. In the words of classic garage rockers The Hombres, Let It Out (Let It All Hang Out).

Which, in turn, leads to the words of the far more sophisticated David Bowie. We Can Be Heroes.

As I watch the highlights again today, I'm struck by how many of the current Tigers have authored an iconic moment this season, a game or play for the ages. DeMarre Carroll, like Doug Smith or Steve Stipanovich before him, is for all time, the kind of player best remembered for a body of work. But many of his teammates, like a handful of Tigers through history, simply freeze time.

If I say Mark Dressler, you say Notre Dame, 1980. If I say Lee Coward, you say Jayhawk Assassin. If I say Corey Tate, you say The Shot, Circa '97.

And now, if I say Zaire Taylor, you say Texas and Kansas. If I say Kimmie! you say 15 points in 6 minutes. If I say Leo, you say The Shot That Beat Marquette. If I say Marcus Denmon, you say The Shot Heard 'Round the World.

And if I say J.T. (pardon me, Jesus Tyrannosaurus) Tiller, you conjure up an image of a basketball Atlas, with shoulders big and broad enough to carry a program's impossible hopes past an immovable object. If I say 2009, you say The Team That Would Not Die, The Season That Would Not End.

In The Wild One, when bad boy Johnny Strabler is asked what he's rebelling against, he replies "What you got?" In twenty years, when someone asks me who was the hero of Mizzou's 2008-09 season, I'll just say, Brando-style, "Who you got?"

Saturday a.m.: Up to 10 in RPI

Michael Atchison — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 14:04:11 -0000

Saturday a.m.: Up to 10 in RPI

Tigers move five spots in a day, which is fairly shocking at this time of year. And Baylor moves into the top 50 (in at 49), meaning that Mizzou picked up two wins over top 50 teams yesterday. Currently 8-4 vs. the top 50 (4-3 vs. the top 25), with a chance to move to 9-4 today. Five of the nine best wins would be road/neutrals. The three seed is there for the taking.

DeJuan Blair, National Player of the Year

Michael Atchison — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 20:58:14 -0000

DeJuan Blair, National Player of the Year

John Gasaway bucks the conventional thinking.

Some historical context for last night's Illinois - Penn State game

Michael Atchison — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 14:43:17 -0000

[Editor's note: Bumped from FanPosts because it is highly topical and deserves top billing]

Last night, Penn State and Illinois played a game for the ages. Which ages? How about the Paleozoic and Mesozoic? Or, at the very least, an age before Archduke Franz Ferdinand became a household name.

As you may know, the Nittany Lions traveled to Champaign-Urbana and topped the Illini, 38-33, the lowest combined ouput in a Division I game since Monmouth and Princeton conspired to score 62 points one night in 2005. Together, the teams converted just 28 of 96 field goal attempts (29.2%), and just 6 of 33 three-point tries (18.2%). Illinois not only failed to make a free throw in the entire game, they failed to take one.

Let's put this in context. Exactly 100 years earlier, on February 18, 1909, the Missouri Tigers hosted Washington University of St. Louis, and prevailed, 28-21, the teams scoring at a somewhat slower pace than the Lions and Illini. Here are some things you should know about that game in particular, and the game of basketball in general as it existed a century ago. There was no shot clock. There was no three-point line. There was no rule against camping out in the lane. The jump shot had not yet been invented, and the tallest players usually checked in at around six-foot-two. The game clock ran continuously, even during free throws and the jump balls that followed every single basket. Missouri's star players were named Curly and Zeke. The game was still a half-century away from integration.

After I saw the score, I e-mailed an Illinois alum who happens to be one of my closest friends, and noted that 38-33 was a score from the 1920s. And then I looked at the record book to confirm. Sure enough, Missouri beat Kansas 41-30 on February 26, 1921. The Tigers topped Oklahoma 48-36 on February 12, 1927. They fell to Nebraska 39-33 on February 25, 1929.

Through all of this, one burning question remains. Why can't Illinois ever shoot like that against Mizzou?

Last Team Standing

Michael Atchison — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 15:40:56 -0000

[Editor's Note: bumped from FanPosts]

They led with their chin all night long. They kept coming forward, like Jake LaMotta in Raging Bull, absorbing punches to their face until their opponent couldn’t swing any more. Then, trailing 54-43 with eight minutes to play, the Missouri Tigers looked at their rival and asked “is that all you got?”

And Kansas looked down and said “yes.”

That’s when the latest chapter in Border War lore was written.

I was there in 1987, when Lee Coward buried a three-pointer – and the Jayhawks – at the buzzer en route to a wholly unexpected league title. I was there in 1990, when Doug Smith and Anthony Peeler took KU’s number one ranking and claimed it for themselves. I was in front of my television in 1997, kneeling, praying, weeping and exalting, when Corey Tate’s jumper in the second overtime gave invincible Kansas its only loss of the regular season. And I was there in 2006, when the Tigers trailed by seven with less than forty seconds remaining, only to have Thomas Gardner heave a series of three-pointers through the rim on his way to 40 points and a shocking victory.

But none of those moments was any more shocking than what happened at Mizzou Arena on Monday night.

Missouri was dead. Dead. The Tigers were stifled by the Jayhawks’ oppressive half-court defense, and more particularly by Cole Aldrich, KU’s sensational sophomore center, who dominated the game on the defensive end for thirty-two minutes. His 15 rebounds and five blocked shots tell only part of the story. He took up residence inside Leo Lyons’s head, and intimidated every Tiger guard who dared drive to the hoop.

But he also spent precious few minutes on the bench, and in the end, that made the difference.

By the end, Aldrich was dead. Dead. A pace that yielded 46 second-half points for Missouri made Aldrich carry his massive frame up and down the court too many times. Kansas coach Bill Self has worked magic this year with a team that lost six of its top seven players from last season. But he can’t work miracles. He can’t make Sasha Kaun or Darnell Jackson materialize at the end of the bench when his center is gassed. And so with the game on the line, Aldrich stayed on the floor, but he had so little left. That’s when Missouri attacked. DeMarre Carroll to the hoop. Leo Lyons to the hoop. Guards slashing through the lane. The lead went from eleven to eight to five to two.

And then Leo Lyons sank two free throws and it was tied.

You know the rest. J.T. Tiller hit a jumper to give Mizzou its first lead in 29 minutes, and Zaire Taylor hit his second game-winning shot in a week, and officially became The Closer. He will never have to buy his own drink in the state of Missouri again.

This couldn’t have occurred with any other visitor at Mizzou Arena. Games like this don’t happen against Colorado or Kansas State. In this series, anything can happen. Anything does happen. And it always seems to happen in Columbia. Think of the ten most memorable Missouri-Kansas games. How many of them happened in Allen Fieldhouse?

The Tigers and Jayhawks bring out the best in each other. And sometimes, like on Monday, they bring out the worst, but in a gloriously satisfying way. From the beginning, it was clear that the teams were too amped up, they wanted it too much, the crowd was just a little too nervous. And once the scoring started, it was a game sometimes short on perfect execution, but continuously long on desire. The teams didn’t always play well, but they always played hard. So, so hard. Norm Stewart hard. Ted Owens hard.

The game, of course, will be remembered for the result. But it will also be remembered for another reason. After some time in the wilderness, basketball is back at Mizzou. When the last second ticked away, the students didn’t storm The Norm, the players stormed the students, forming an impromptu mosh pit of bliss under the hoop where the Jayhawks’ last shot fell harmless. The Tigers embraced Mizzou on Monday night. And Mizzou embraced them back.