The Missouri Tigers are one win away from advancing to their first ever NCAA Final Four following last night’s impressive 102-91 win over Memphis to advance to the Elite 8. Mizzou, now 31-6 will advance to play UConn for the West Regional title on Saturday with a 3:40 pm tip CT.
The Tigers got an offensive shot in the arm from the Big 12’s co-defensive player of the year J.T. Tiller who scored a career high 23 points, while coming up with a game high three steals.
"J.T. set the tone as far as offensively with the way he was attacking the basket. He showed that you can get to the hole on them. Once that happened I think the whole team just followed his lead," said junior Zaire Taylor.
It was obvious Tiller wasn’t having any issues with his wrist that he dinged up in the Marquette game. "My wrist is good. As you can see out there. I’m 100%."
Tiller was 10 of 16 to lead Mizzou. All of the Tiger starters scored in double figures. Leo Lyons had a double-double with 15 points, 12 rebounds.
The play that may have sparked Missouri to build up a 24 point lead in the first four minutes of the second half was Marcus Denmon’s 65 foot shot at the buzzer to put Missouri up by 13. Just moments before that he banked a long two pointer to beat the shot clock and after Shawn Taggert dunked with five second to play, the Tigers had a hard time getting the ball back in bounds. Justin Safford flipped it to Denmon who dribbled once and let his high arcing shot fly which hit nothing but net.
I thought Matt Lawrence had a good game. A 25% three point shooter against top 25 teams, Lawrence was 3 for 6 from behind the arc and finished with 13 points, plus added three rebounds and a steal. Not bad for a kid who didn’t fit Mike Anderson’s system. His three pointer with 7:40 to play in the first half put Mizzou up for good at 29-28. It was Lawrence’s three pointer from the far corner that built the lead up to 24 with 15:58 to play.
Memphis made two runs at the Tigers from that point on. The first came right after that timeout. Memphis outscored the Tigers 11-0 over a 5:24 span that cut the lead to 13. Missouri then held Memphis in that 13-15 point range for the next six and a half minutes, until freshmen Tyreke Evans drove for a layup, after Leo Lyons missed a point blank layup at the other end, to cut the lead to 83-72. Then Evans, who finished with a game high 33 points, hit two free throws and the lead was down to single digits since 2:13 of the first half.
When Lyons missed that shot, I thought that gave Memphis one more boost and you could feel the Tigers tense up a bit. This of course was all taking place with DeMarre Carroll on the bench who picked up his fourth foul. With Lyons and Carroll in foul trouble, Memphis kept pounding the ball inside.
Memphis is not a real good three point shooting team and they may have let Missouri off the hook with their inability to hit free throws at key times. Memphis was just 18 of 32 from the line.
The Tigers were 30 of 45, not great by any means, but down the stretch when Memphis needed to foul, the Tigers came up big again at the free throw line making 9 of 10 in the last 1:30.
Listen to the full press conference by clicking on the link below.
Listen to Tigers postgame (mp3)
