COLUMBIA, MO – Season two of the Dennis Gates era of Missouri basketball is officially under way in Columbia, Missouri. Students and fans filled Mizzou Arena to watch the Missouri Tigers’ new product. Missouri earned a 101-79 victory over Arkansas-Pine Bluff Monday night.
The Tigers started their season by winning the opening tip, and then Sean East II put them on the board with a 3-pointer. Despite fouling out with 6:50 to go in the game, East finished as Missouri’s leading scorer with 21 points on 7-8 for shooting and five free throws. East did not take his scoring for granted. When asked about how he worked on his shooting during the offseason, East II said, “I put a lot of work into my shot over the last two years, really my whole life. It was just going well tonight… we’re gonna stay in the gym and try to keep it up.”
The Tigers didn’t play perfectly in their season opener. Over the course of the game the team racked up 26 fouls.
“They (UAPB) shot over 30 free throws and they were fouls 90 feet away from the basket that we were defending,” coach Dennis Gates said when asked about his takeaways from Monday night.
“If we minimize those easy free throws, we may be able to minimize the rhythm that we allowed them to get into.” 25 of UAPB’s 79 points came from the charity stripe. Kylen Milton, UAPB’s junior guard, scored 15 of his 34 points from the charity stripe. Missouri ended the night with four players in foul trouble, something that they will look to clean up as the season progresses
Another key aspect of this game was the play of Tamar Bates. Nearing the end of the first half, Tamar Bates made a layup with 2:35 on the clock. Little did everyone know that Bates would go on to score the final 10 points for Missouri in the half.
“Coach (Gates) always emphasizes the guys that come off the bench being a spark,” Bates said of his scoring run to end the half.
“I just took advantage of my matchups and my teammates got me the ball when I was open, but I just let the game come to me, and that’s what me and Coach Gates have been talking about for the past week.”
Gates was impressed with his junior guard’s scoring to end the first half.
“He started to play how he played in high school with his instincts,” added Gates. “When he’s played with his instincts, and he’s not thinking, he’s at his best.”
The Missouri Tigers played unselfish basketball on Monday night. Five players finished in double digits, and seven players finished in the assist column. One thing that Tiger fans saw on Monday night was the court vision of Jesus Carralero Martin. Martin finished the game with four assists, including a no-look pass to Noah Carter that led to two points for the Tigers. Gates talked about the team’s unselfish nature when asked about the amount of points the Tigers scored in their season opener.
“Our competition, internal competition, in a healthy way, does not have envy does not have jealousy, it has absolute support… I think we have a great personality in our program where guys are always going to give their very best” Gates said.
Missouri will look to move to 2-0 as they host Memphis on Friday at 8 p.m..