Study Hall: Mizzou 86, Cleveland State 59

It’s over.

We knew once the non-conference schedule was released that November was going to be a slog. The good news, Missouri took care of business. They did what they were supposed to do. They didn’t really exceed what they were supposed to do, which might be a cause of consternation. The expected margin over each game totaled to 188 points, and Missouri won the games by a total of 198 points. They started the preseason in KenPom.com at 28th and as I’m typing this they’re sitting at 30th. They’ve basically treaded water for a month of the season.

Things could be worse, of course.

And there are a lot of ways I was happy Dennis Gates could line up his former Assistant Rob Summers’ basketball team, as well as his own former employer. Of all the games we watched this month, I think this one made the most sense to set up. If you’re going to line up a series of Q4 games, at least get some of your good friends a check they can cash.

As for the game itself, it was one of the stranger games I can remember. Missouri scored 23 points before Cleveland State scored one. The Tigers won the game by 27 points. So the first 9 minutes of the game was Mizzou +23, the other 31 minutes was Mizzou +4. It didn’t help that Missouri attempted the most threes (38) so far on the young season, while shooting their second lowest percentage (28.9%). When 57% of your shot attempts come from behind the arc and you miss a whole lot of those attempts it’s going to skew your productivity a bit.

It wasn’t the cleanest game, but as I mentioned in previous Study Halls, this week can brew some lackluster outcomes. So at least you hit the margin, even if it took a couple last minute threes to hit.

TEAM STATS

I’m beginning to be concerned about the turnover problem. Missouri just isn’t clean with the basketball the way they’ve (largely) been since Gates has taken over. Their worst season was two years ago and the TOR was still under 17%, this year they’re at 19.2%. So with 16 turnovers, and 27 three point misses, a 1.23 points per possession is pretty incredible.

• It’s worth noting that CSU is undersized, but still being +10 is notable. The Tigers have a bigger roster and they’ve used that size to neutralize most of their opponents on the glass so far.

• For the Tigers, they really didn’t shoot many free throws this last game either. The FTR on the season is down from last year, but it would’ve been hard to top 2nd in the country.

Through offensive rebounding, they won the FGA battle each of the last two games which is a good sign as the competition steps up. They haven’t really been winning that battle much this season.

INDIVIDUAL STATS

On the season: Mark Mitchell 16, Jacob Crews 11, Jayden Stone 7, Anthony Robinson 6, Shawn Phillips Jr. 4, Jevon Porter 3, Annor Boateng 1

GameScore metrics are really good at capturing offensive impact, and with a lackluster day from the offense, guys who collected offensive rebounds saw their value jump up quite a bit. As an example, Shawn Phillips had a pretty forgettable afternoon but he snuck in thanks to three assists and three blocks. Mark Mitchell also wasn’t super noticeable but he didn’t miss any shots, had four assists and a couple offensive rebounds. Jacob Crews took a lot of shots but he was the only real scorer, and added 4 offensive rebounds.

It was really just a workman like effort to put up 86 points.

That’s just a whole lot of red and orange in the Turnover column. It’s also worth pointing out that only Crews saw his possessions tip over 10. If Mark Mitchell has many more games with a 10.2% Usage, Mizzou might need to recalibrate what they’re doing.

Hopefully Anthony Robinson II got his poor game out of the way with Notre Dame and Kansas up next. He’s been struggling to figure out how to take on more of an offensive role.

I don’t know, I’ve just been having a hard time getting really into the last few games. This is just too many Q4s in a row. I don’t know how this impacts the team and their growth within the season, but they’ve got to be hankering for a challenge. There are only so many test runs you can go through before you want some real action. And I’m also not sure what we’ve learned about this team we didn’t already know after 4 games.

Tuesday it’s Notre Dame in the ACC-SEC Challenge. Then Sunday, it’s Kansas in Kansas City. Things are going to get real fast.

I’ve moved the glossary to a static page at RockM+ to reduce the size of the bottom of this post.

So if you’re looking for what any of these stats mean, Check out the Glossary!

In attempting to update Study Hall, I’ve moved away from Touches/Possession and moving into the Rates a little more. This is a little experimental so if there’s something you’d like to see let me know and I’ll see if there’s an easy visual way to present it.

If there’s something you’d like to see more of an explanation on, drop a note and let me know!