The No. 21/22 University of Missouri men’s basketball team secured a No. 6 seed in the West Regional of the 2025 NCAA Tournament and will face No. 11 seed Drake on Thursday, March 20—the game tips off at 6:35 p.m. on truTV in Wichita, Kansas.
This marks Mizzou’s highest tournament seeding since 2012 and just the fourth time in the past 31 seasons that the Tigers have been seeded sixth or higher. The winner will face either No. 3 Texas Tech or No. 14 UNC Wilmington on Saturday.
Mizzou is one of a record 14 SEC teams to earn a tournament bid this year under third-year head coach Dennis Gates. The Tigers enter the tournament with a 22-11 record and are ranked No. 21 in the AP poll and No. 22 in the USA Today Coaches poll.
Drake secured its spot in the tournament by winning the Missouri Valley Conference title. The Bulldogs come in with a 30-3 record and are making their third consecutive NCAA Tournament appearance. The two programs have a long history dating back to 1910, with Missouri leading the series 27-7. Their last meeting was in 1987 when the Tigers won 76-74 at Drake.
This is Missouri’s 30th NCAA Tournament appearance and first in two years. The Tigers have 23 tournament wins in program history, with five Elite Eight appearances (1944, 1976, 1994, 2002, and 2009).
Drake is coached by Ben McCollum. McCollum amassed a record of 394-91 (81.2 win percentage) at Northwest Missouri State and earned five NABC Division II National Coach of the Year awards, the most for a single coach in Division II history. McCollum also garnered nine Mid-America Intercollegiate Athletics Association (MIAA) Coach of the Year awards and was a 2024 Missouri Sports Hall of Fame inductee. While in Maryville, he won four national championships (2017, 2019, 2021, 2022) including three tournaments in a row (the 2020 NCAA Tournament was canceled due to the global pandemic).
Eight players on the Drake roster were raised in Missouri. Four players transferred from Northwest Missouri to join McCollum at Drake.