Finals Week is always a pretty quiet time from a sports perspective. The football team is either done or on bowl break (thankfully it’s the latter this year for Mizzou), and the basketball team probably doesn’t have any games scheduled.

That means a series of “taking stock” articles for both sports. On the football side, the Trib looked back at Mizzou Football’s three-part story. But most of the links are basketball-related.

Our own Josh Matejka delivered his season-to-date report card on Monday, and other outlets are doing the same.

The Trib looked into what we’ve learned so far, the KC Star took a look at Terrence Phillips’ holiday toy drive and columnist Vahe Gregorian complimented Cuonzo Martin’s ability to keep his team dialed into the present even without Michael Porter Jr.’s presence.

“Of course you’d like to have him out there; everybody wants that level of talent out there on the floor,” Martin said. “But if a family member loses a job, somebody gets sick, that’s life.

“So we continue to move forward, we make the adjustment and we deal with it. We feel the pain, but we still have to push forward because there will be a tomorrow.”

All of which helps explain how MU has essentially shrugged off wobbly efforts at Utah and against Emporia State as Porter’s mysterious absence was about to be clarified — with the news that the would-be program savior would likely be out three to four months and miss the only season he seemed assured of playing here before leaving for the NBA.

Yep, everything’s nice and quiet on the homefron—

[GLASS BREAKS]

He’s treated the likes of Michael Jordan and Tiger Woods, and he’s been in the field for 32 years. His name is Rick Lehman, and on Tuesday he piqued Missouri fans’ interest.

As part of a weekly segment on Frank Cusumano’s radio show on 590 AM in St. Louis, Lehman spoke about the injury status of Missouri men’s basketball’s star-studded freshman Michael Porter Jr.

“I think he’ll be back in the next four weeks, and that’s more than just a guess,” he said. [...]

“My belief is that he’ll be back six to eight weeks from the time of surgery pretty comfortably.”

Honestly, I’m kind of wishing that this guy, who doesn’t appear to have any direct ties to the Porter family, would have kept his opinions to himself on this matter, but it does bear mentioning that four weeks from now is January 10. Mizzou plays Georgia at home that day. If Lehman’s assessment is true, that would mean Porter misses only two or three games in SEC play.

(It also bears mentioning that Lehman is very, very, very renowned in his field.)

Nothing like a nice MPJ rumor to liven up an otherwise quiet week.

More Links:

• Have you been catching how absolutely dominant Mizzou signee Torrence Watson has been so far this season?

• CBC receiver Kamryn Babb, who appeared to eliminate Mizzou a while back, committed to Ohio State as expected yesterday.

• PowerMizzou, meanwhile, broke down the film of recent Mizzou receiver commit Khmari Thompson. Basically, “track star who can actually run routes.” Sign me up.

• You can make dramatic, extended highlights for any win.

• Hey there, Lindsey Cunningham.

• Mizzou Gymnastics will begin the season with a No. 17 preseason ranking.
• Incoming Mizzou Volleyball JUCO transfer Sun Wenting absolutely tore things up for Miami Dade College this year, averaging 3.5 kills per set (for perspective, Kira Lawson and Melanie Crow each averaged 2.4 this season) on her way to first-team JUCO All-American honors. It appears the 5’11 product of Heilongjiang, China, can jump out of the gym.