Missouri men’s basketball coach Mike Anderson used the old cliché, “We’re not about to make excuses,” but the Tigers were victims of unusual circumstances in losing their fourth straight Big 12 road game in Stillwater, OK. The team arrived at the campus of Oklahoma State on Wednesday at 2 p.m. after three days of travel and lost to the Cowboys 76-70.
The team left Columbia Monday evening before blizzard conditions arrived, but couldn’t fly out Tuesday morning. Instead the team stayed in a Kansas City hotel Monday and Tuesday nights before flying out Wednesday morning. It was evident the Tigers lacked early rhythm as OSU jumped out to a 15 point lead 10 minutes into the game.
After the game Anderson said, “Every night you have to show up. We didn’t play the brand of basketball we’ve been playing this year. And you have to credit Oklahoma State because they did a great job of attacking us.
“We aren’t going to make any excuses but at the same time it was a different schedule than we usually have. We flew in (Wednesday) and it seemed like it took us a while to get into any rhythm, especially early on.”
Phil Pressey and Marcus Denmon each scored 15 points as the Tigers rallied and played better in the second half. Ricardo Ratliffe finished with 13 points. Kim English had another subpar night going 1 for 8 and scoring just four points.
Laurence Bowers did see some action, not starting, but he played for 15 minutes after he was questionable from Saturday night’s game at Texas. The Tigers return home Saturday to face Colorado before heading to Kansas next Monday.