Well, I applaud Bill C. for his postseason basketball work, as I’m sure the rest of us are still making that repetitive-tongue-washing-motion to get the lingering taste of last Friday out of our mouths. I had this piece outlined and ready to write up and finish this week, hopefully to be posted amongst all the joyous NCAA banter. It was not to be. Suddenly I had to re-write with a bit more finality and retrospect than I anticipated. So, through all the tears and with fingers numb from tearing at my clothes, here goes.

How will we remember Ricardo Ratliffe here at Mizzou?

He didn’t bring the demonstrative and dreadlocked flair of DeMarre Carroll. He didn’t bring the boyish and infectious joy of Arthur Johnson. He didn’t bring the large of Monte Hardge. He didn’t bring a twin, a la the Haleys.

What did he bring? Tattoos that made Mid-Missouri uncomfortable, hairstyles for days and a sweet left-handed baby-hook shot. 1,758 minutes on the floor for the Tigers. 63.5% of field goals made. 6.7 rebounds per game. 1.1 block per game. All-Big 12 second team, Big 12 Newcomer of the Year, and JuCo National Player of the Year.

So, he didn’t set the FG% mark that he chased for a majority of the season. That was the narrative of choice for the national media whenever the spotlight was on 'Cardo. Had it worked out, it would have been a great story. But my narrative is much less quantifiable. How much is being the "5" in this four-guard lineup "worth"? After Bowers went down, and Steve Moore had gotten about as many pep talks as he could get, Ricardo had to stare at the ceiling with some sort of excitement/dread knowing he was going to be "The Frontcourt" of this Tiger team. Team rebounding is a great concept, but somebody has to bang with the other team’s dedicated rebounders. Cleaning up after our risk-taking perimeter defense without getting into foul trouble. Transition offense and defense. All the things that Bill C. can't measure. (A number that’s shrinking every day!)

The questions of what might have been will always impact what we remember of his career here. What if Bowers was healthy this year? What if Norfolk St hadn’t happened? What if Tony Mitchell had been here, too? So many things to ponder and wonder about his legacy.

As a soccer fan, the #10 jersey is pretty sacred. And while he might not have ended up in the Peeler, Chevious, Smith, Sunvold territory; I was proud to root for, watch and write about Ricardo Ratliffe as a Tiger. It was worth it.

Your Trifecta: PPressey-Dixon-Denmon. Your winner: nobody. As it should be.

We'll go ahead and dump in all relevant links here, too, just to make it one huge "picking the scab" experience. "Shocked" ... "stunned" ... "stunned" ... "shocked" ... the loss was so unexpected that even headline writers were at a loss for creativity...

• MUtigers.com: Mizzou Drops 86-84 NCAA Contest to Norfolk State
• The Trib: Norfolk State stuns second-seeded Missouri
  The Trib: Kyle O'Quinn has become Kansas' favorite adopted son
  The Trib: Season ends too soon for MU basketball fans
  The Trib (Joe Walljasper): End of an amazing journey is just a wreck

  This sport is all about March. Everything that leads up to now is the back story. The conference seasons are great, the conference tournaments are entertaining but the defining moments are what happen in the NCAA Tournament.

  The Tigers didn't have to win it all to validate themselves, didn't even have to make it to the Final Four — although President Barack Obama forwarded them to New Orleans in his bracket — but they couldn't do this.

  Missouri isn't Duke, where these opportunities roll around every year and the rafters are overflowing with championship banners. At Missouri, where legitimate chances to make that elusive first Final Four are once-in-a-decade occurrences, to bow out in the first game is an epic waste. […]

  The Tigers will be judged as tournament flops based on expectations they inflated way beyond what was projected in the preseason. They spent four months proving that what they had (quickness, smarts) was more important than what they didn't (size, depth). The senior class won more games than any other group in school history.

  It was an amazing ride, but there is the matter of the crash.

• The Missourian: Missouri stunned by Norfolk State
  The Missourian: How Norfolk State upset Missouri in NCAA Tournament
  The Missourian: Omaha crowd propels Norfolk State in Missouri's loss
  The Missourian: PHOTO GALLERY: Missouri shocked by Norfolk State
• KC Star: Mizzou shocked by Norfolk State 86-84
  KC Star: Tigers clawed back but couldn't get ahead
  KC Star: MU notebook | English struggles
  KC Star: Norfolk State had a belief, and a plan
  KC Star: Joy, pain, spill into streets of Omaha after upset
  KC Star (Sam Mellinger): Historic upset brings highs, lows that will linger for years
  KC Star: Missouri season in review
  KC Star: Missouri loss shortchanges Big 12
• Post-Dispatch: Norfolk State shocks Mizzou 86-84
  Post-Dispatch: Mizzou hurt on boards in defeat
  Post-Dispatch: Shock and dismay for Mizzou
  Post-Dispatch: Norfolk State delirious after beating MU
  Post-Dispatch (Bryan Burwell): Mizzou misery, Norfolk elation show it's March

  With his eyes bright red from tears he'd already shed, English sat in the far corner of the locker room on Friday night and answered every question fired at him. He broke down all the basketball. He sorted through all his emotions, too. But midway through the second wave of reporters to surround him, English leaned back and let out a groan that truly told you how hard this was all going down.

  "Awwwwhhh," he said, tilting his head back against the wall and closing his eyes for a split second of sheer agony. He bit down on his lip. He shook his head. You could almost imagine the flashes of his basketball life that were whirling around in his head at that moment.

  "I bled, I sweat and I cried for these six letters on the front of my jersey," he said. "I came here with aspirations of helping to take this basketball program from the dumps and trying to take it somewhere our fans couldn't fathom. And we tried, we fought and we fought for four years." [...]

  It came down to a buzzer beater that didn't fall, and when Phil Pressey's 3-pointer missed, it sent the arena into a frenzy, with all these Kansas and Florida fans celebrating too.

  But it also left the Tigers slumped and in tears.

  "I was thinking about how much hard work we put in," said Pressey. "Six straight months of staying after late, doing the extra stuff, grinding just to win a national championship and it hurts to see that all the work we put in was useless because we lost."

• PowerMizzou: Tigers shocked by Spartans
  PowerMizzou: One and Done
  PowerMizzou: PHOTOS: The Baseline View
  PowerMizzou: PMTV-HD: Omaha Nightmare
• Fox Sports MW: No. 2 seed Missouri stunned by No. 15 Norfolk St
  Fox Sports MW: Memorable season cut short for Missouri
• KBIA Sports Extra: Mizzou's storybook season comes to a shocking end in NCAA Tournament
• ESPN.com: Rapid Reaction: Norfolk St. 86, Missouri 84
  ESPN.com: Norfolk State's win a statistical shocker
• The Dagger: Shock: No. 15 Norfolk State upsets No. 2 Missouri
• SB Nation KC: VIDEO: Missouri's Final Play Against Norfolk State

Continue reading this post »

(Author's Note: I know dcrockett17 normally does the postgame postmortem, but I needed to write about this game. Not trying to step on his toes, as I hope he has his own thoughts to add later.)

As I sit and write this, it’s been about two hours since Phil Pressey’s desperation three pointer clanged off the back of the rim and the Tigers fell to the Spartans, 86-84.

No, not the Michigan State Spartans but rather the Norfolk State Spartans.

Not exactly the Spartans I think most Tigers fans expected to be defeated by.

I’m numb. There really isn’t any way to describe the feeling. Simply numb as I sit here at home, trying to eat dinner and process exactly where everything went wrong.

When Missouri shoots 53 percent from the field, 45 percent from three and makes 13 three pointers, I just expect them to win. At least, I expect this team to win.

But when the other team plays out of its mind, making twice as many three pointers in this game than they averaged during the regular season, shoots 54 percent from the field and over 50 percent from three, it’s hard.

I kept waiting for Mizzou to make a run in the second half, one of those 12-0 or 17-2 knockdowns that would allow the Tigers to assert control.

But the run never came.

Continue reading this post »

We've said for a while now that if Mizzou had a fatal flaw, it was quite possibly not rebounding or depth issues, but perimeter defense. Sure enough, poor perimeter defense ended Mizzou's season today, quite a few rounds before everybody hoped. Norfolk State made some open looks early, got confident enough to make some well-covered looks in the middle of the game, and just kept right on making them late. Missouri came back from a six-point deficit in the final two minutes, but when Kyle O'Quinn put back an airballed jumper and got fouled with about 35 seconds left, Norfolk State had a lead they wouldn't relinquish. A few free throws, an odd inbounds play, and a missed buzzer-beater from Phil Pressey later, Mizzou's season was over.

Mizzou's offense was as good as normal for much of the game, but they just had no answer for a ridiculously confident Norfolk State squad. A crowd full of Kansas fans (in the arena for their game tonight) helped turn it into a veritable home game for NSU, and it carried them to a monumental upset. Marcus Denmon, Mike Dixon and Phil Pressey were all excellent on the offensive end -- 62 combined points, 12 3-pointers, double-digit assists -- but they made some mistakes late, their perimeter defense was as culpable as anybody else's, and ... let's just say that Kim English picked a bad time to have an absolutely horrendous game (two points on 1-for-7 shooting). And that's all it takes for your season to end in the Round of 64.

More later. For now ... yeah. I said this morning that the NCAA Tournament is cruel. We didn't need reaffirmation of that, but we got it. Time to sit around and sigh for a while.

(If you're just in the mood to throw things and vent, go here.)

Most of the time, writing about life as a Mizzou fan (or any fan, for that matter), is relatively repetitive. Here's why [Random Bad News] is probably not as bad as you think (so stop freaking out). Here's why you should soak in [Random Great Win] as long as you possibly can. Here are some links. Here are some numbers. I love it -- if I didn't, I wouldn't have attempted to make a career out of it -- but I still relish the opportunity to stretch the emotional legs a bit.

Just a hair under three years ago, I wrote what I still feel is one of my favorite posts. In all, it was one of the easiest I've written. The Mizzou men's basketball team had already done the leg work; all I had to do was say thank you.

There had been two entire four-year classes ('04-'07, '05-'08) that had come to the university and graduated without seeing their team go to the NCAA Tournament. That hadn't happened since well before I was born. The thought of having a great basketball program was something of a joke (I think we even made some of those jokes on RMN in a football podcast way back when). I mean, hell, look at how hard we were struggling to find great, encouraging things to say about the team not that long ago. Even if we snuck into the tourney as a 10-seed or something, would anybody notice? That's the basketball version of making the Independence Bowl. Would a connection still have been made?

Now look at us. Again, I'm not necessarily talking about the 30 wins, the Sweet Sixteen, and the Big 12 Tournament title, though that's been absolutely fantastic. I'm talking about more than that. In just four months (and really, it's been less than three), this university has grown to love its basketball team again.

Three years ago, the sky was the limit. Kim English was almost single-handedly carrying Mizzou to the Sweet Sixteen as a freshman. Marcus Denmon was stretching the lines of believability with a three-quarter court shot that made Dick Enberg yelp. Laurence Bowers was already becoming the Party Starter. Mike Anderson's system was working. Mizzou Arena was a death trap (or, if you are local TV personality Scotty Highmark, a wood chipper). ESPN's Fran Fraschilla could not contain the outright crush he had on the Missouri program and style. ("Pressure is cumulative!") Mizzou basically came within about two minutes of the Final Four, and there was almost no doubt that, at some point over the next three seasons, they would get another chance.

But then that chance didn't come, at least not immediately. Following the departures of DeMarre Carroll, Leo Lyons and Matt Lawrence, Mizzou took a predictable step backwards in 2009-10, but they still advanced to the Round of 32, and they still gave eventual Final Four team West Virginia all it could handle. English, Denmon and Bowers had taken ownership of the team, recruiting was picking up, Mike Anderson had (again) decided against other job opportunities, and despite whatever lingering annoyance existed from the Jimmy Sexton Experience, there was still, to say the least, all the hope in the world about the future.

Continue reading this post »

LEAVE YOUR TRIFECTA PICKS IN COMMENTS. And while you're at it, join Rock M's bracket contest (in addition to the Yahoo!/SBN contest, of course) as well!

In games like this, when Missouri is taking on an opponent it has had no reason to track all season, here is where numbers can very much come in handy. In gauging how good Norfolk State is or can be, we should start by using Pomeroy's rankings to compare them to other teams on Missouri's schedule this season.

No. 110 Mercer (Mizzou won, 81-63)
No. 111 Texas A&M (Mizzou won, 70-51 and 71-62)
No. 213 Norfolk State
No. 226 SE Missouri State (Mizzou won, 83-68)
No. 233 Niagara (Mizzou won, 83-52)
No. 234 Northwestern State (Mizzou won, 90-56)
No. 243 Texas Tech (Mizzou won, 63-50 and 81-59)

Mizzou played just five games against teams ranked within 50 spots of Norfolk State (all lower); they went 5-0 with an average victory of 80.0 to 57.0. So in looking at all the numbers below, that should be our starting point for the discussion.

Norfolk State Spartans (25-9)

Norfolk State won 25 games this season primarily through size. They outrebounded opponents, they shot pretty well near the basket, they drew fouls like crazy, and they prevented opponents from finding many easy buckets. Their ball-handling is suspect, and their 3-point shooting is actually quite dreadful, but their defense is solid (when they keep opponents off the glass, anyway) and they've got something that most teams in the country lack: a true, solid big man.

Continue reading this post »

This is the first in a (hopefully) six-part series highlighting 10 things you may not know about Mizzou’s opponents in the NCAA Tournament. Please keep in mind that while everything below is true, it’s meant in jest.

Better Know An Opponent, Vol. 1: 2009 NCAA Tournament Opponents
Part One – Cornell
Part Two – Marquette
Part Three – Memphis
Part Four – Connecticut

Better Know An Opponent, Vol. 2: 2010 NCAA Tournament Opponents
Part One – Clemson
Part Two – West Virginia

Better Know An Opponent, Vol. 3: 2011 NCAA Tournament Opponents
Part One – Cincinnati

Today’s profile: the Norfolk State Spartans

1) Norfolk State University is a state-supported historically black university in Norfolk, Virginia, founded in 1935. It’s one of 105 HBCUs (that’s historically black colleges and universities) in the nation, which means that it’s an institution of higher learning founded prior to 1964 for the purpose of helping the black community. And yes, I – someone whom my black friends and colleagues refer to as "HAHAHA DUDE SO WHITE" – had to look up what constitutes a historically black college or university. Congratulations, Norfolk State, on making me feel like an uncultured, sheltered, suburban idiot just one paragraph into this piece.

Another thing I learned while researching Norfolk State: there is a legitimate tier system to the higher education realm. Consider, for example, that NSU was founded in 1935 as a unit of Virginia Union University (the Norfolk Unit, that is). Around 1942, it became independent and known as Norfolk Polytechnic College. But wait! Two years later, that college became a part of Virginia State College. College. In 1969, it was separated from Virginia State College and became Norfolk State College. Finally, in 1979, it was granted university status, and renamed Norfolk State University.

That explains the sign hanging in G.W.C. Brown Hall.

Continue reading this post »