KC hoops product Tamar Bates leads Missouri Tigers to blowout victory at Mizzou Arena
On a three-game skid, Missouri basketball needed a remedy to get right heading into the new year.
Welcome to Mizzou Arena, Central Arkansas.
After losses to Kansas, Seton Hall and Illinois, Missouri handed the visiting Bears 92-59 on Saturday afternoon to improve to 8-5 as calendar year 2023 ends and SEC play looms.
The Tigers and Bears played each other close for the majority of the first half. Ten first-half turnovers from MU allowed UCA to keep pace, but the Tigers regrouped. With a big run to end the first half, and a 10-0 run in the second, MU cruised at Mizzou Arena behind a career day from Tamar Bates.
Here are three observations from the win:
Taking care of business
Central Arkansas was 3-11 coming into Saturday’s game. The Tigers, 7-5, needed to bounce back after sitting on a three-game skid following losses to Kansas, Seton Hall and Illinois.
Missouri got what it was looking for.
The Tigers took advantage of the fact they were just better than Central Arkansas. Mizzou took shots when the Bears decided to back down and give the Tigers’ guards space on the perimeter. Bates had 14 points in the first half on 5-of-5 shooting.
Notably, Missouri took a 15-point lead into halftime by holding Central Arkansas without a field goal for the last 5 minutes, 26 seconds of the first half. That continued for the first 2:16 of the second half before UCA hit a 3-pointer and called timeout.
At that point, Missouri was up 19. Eventually, the hosts’ lead swelled to 27 points. There would be no repeat of the Jackson State game.
Improving to 8-5 was what Missouri needed, and the Tigers got it done.
Bates’ offensive breakout
Missouri has been looking for someone to emerge as a second scoring option alongside Sean East.
East, who leads the Tigers in points per game, scored 16 Saturday. He was the second option to Bates, who enjoyed his best afternoon in a MU uniform yet.
The product of Kansas City, Kansas’ Piper High, who played his first two years of college with the Indiana Hoosiers, was perfect from the floor in the first half — his first miss came at the 15:52 mark in the second half via a blown dunk. He finished with a career-high 25 points on 9 of 10 shooting.
Bates’ emergence would greatly benefit MU as SEC play begins, giving more options to East and other teammates like Noah Carter, who’s been trying to will his way out of a slump.
Most importantly, Bates is scoring on all three levels. He can shoot from 3-point range and from mid-range. He was brought to Columbia to attack the basket, and he’s been doing that more often of late.
Bates has now scored in double figures in three straight games. Two of those games saw him score more than 20. He’ll need to continue scoring during the conference potion of the Tigers’ schedule.
A few issues remain...
The Tigers were fine Saturday. They did what they needed to do in order to win comfortably against a team that was clearly less talented.
But MU still struggled to pull away from Central Arkansas in the first half. And that was due to some of the lingering issues we’ve seen from this team this season.
When the Tigers shoot better than 50% from the floor, that’s a massive boon — and usually leads to a large lead. But because of MU’s 10 first-half turnovers, the Tigers led by just a possession or two before Bates’ career day helped them gain some separation.
Central Arkansas also kept pace with MU early thanks to some subpar defensive rotations, wherein the Bears got open dunks when the Tigers either didn’t rotate low enough, or cheated up too high on defense.
It was encouraging to see Missouri correct these issues midway through the first half.
The Star has partnered with the Columbia Daily Tribune for coverage of Missouri Tigers athletics.
