2010s At Mizzou: Top Tigers of the Decade, best of the rest Part 2

We conclude our look at the Tigers of the Decade with a look back at volleyball greatness, #TigerStyle and more revenue sport legends.

By Josh Matejka, Nate Edwards, Brandon Kiley, Karen Steger, Ryan Herrera, and Sam Snelling Dec 27, 2019, 11:30am CST

We’ve spent the last few days investigating the Top 50 Tigers of the 2010s and, to be honest, we’ve seen a lot of revenue sports. How about we change that up a little bit?

In our final look at the best athletes of Mizzou’s decade, nine of the featured athletes were in non-revenue sports. For today’s retrospective, we’ll look back at a decade of volleyball greatness, wrestling dominance and a few baseball greats as well.

If you want to catch up with our 2010s At Mizzou series, check out any of the links below:

Carly Kan

FloSports: FloVolleyball NCAA Women’s Championship-Minneapolis Regional

Mizzou volleyball was one of the school’s most dominant programs in the 2010s and Carly Kan was there for it all. She was the SEC’s Freshman of the Year during the dream 2013 season and is one of two Tigers ever to be a three-time AVCA All-American (and that’s saying nothing of her four All-Region teams and three All-SEC teams). By the time Kan left Missouri to play beach volleyball in her native Hawaii, she’d cemented herself on the Mizzou top 10 lists in kills, points, digs, attacks, and points/digs per set. — Josh Matejka

Molly Kreklow

Mizzou Volleyball wouldn’t be itself without a Kreklow involved, and Molly has been leaving her mark since 2010. After two seasons as an Honorable Mention All-Big 12 player, Kreklow helped lead the SEC transition, earning second-team All-SEC honors in 2012. But she saved the best for last. In the 35-1 2013 season, Kreklow turned in one of the greatest seasons the program has ever seen — she was an AVCA and Volleyball Magazine First Team All-American, SEC Player of the Year and ranked first nationally in assists. Kreklow anchored the most dominant offense the NCAA had seen in the 2010s. Then, after playing for Team USA, she decided to top it all off by carrying on her aunt and uncle’s legacy by coming to coach at her alma mater. — Josh Matejka

Daniel Lewis

Ben Askren. J’Den Cox. Daniel Lewis. That’s the entire list of Mizzou wrestlers to finish their career as a four-time All-Americans. He’ll go down as one the most accomplished wrestlers in the history of the state of Missouri. Lewis was a 4-time state champion at Blue Springs where he finished his high school career with a nearly impossible 186-4 overall record. He went on to finish his Mizzou career with a similarly unbelievable 43-3 record in duals, including a 19-1 record in conference duals. — Brandon Kiley

Kameron Misner

A five-tool player with such enticing potential that not even a junior season that felt a little underwhelming and a foot injury that forced him to miss almost all of SEC play in 2018 could make Kameron Misner drop out of the top 35 picks of the 2019 MLB Draft. Only one other Missouri position player has been a first-round pick (as long as you consider competitive balance selections part of the first round), which only helps to solidify Misner’s spot on this list. — Ryan Herrera

Willie Miklus

Brian Smith has built a juggernaut of a wrestling program at Mizzou. What was once a bottom-feeder has become a perennial top 15 program nationally. It’s hard for wrestlers to truly stand out among their peers when their peers are all ranked among the nations’ best. But that’s exactly what Willie Miklus was able to do in his time at Missouri.

The 2015 MAC Freshman of the Year eventually developed into the 2018 197-pound MAC Champion and the program’s seventh 3-time All-American. He made the difficult decision of transferring from Mizzou after his 2018 conference title to be closer to his father while his father battled ALS. — Brandon Kiley

J’Mon Moore

COLLEGE FOOTBALL: OCT 28 Missouri at UConn

A receiver who will unfortunately be remembered more for things that happened off the field than on the field was one of the most productive receivers in program history. He and Jeremy Maclin are the only Tigers in program history to surpass the 1,000 yard receiving mark in back-to-back seasons. That’s an incredible accomplishment. — Brandon Kiley

Mitch Morse

NCAA FOOTBALL: JAN 01 Buffalo Wild Wings Citrus Bowl - Missouri v Minnesota

Imagine a player so versatile, so smart and so skilled that he has the ability to take snaps at literally every single position along the offensive line. That’s not fair. Morse didn’t just take snaps at every position along the O-Line. He dominated at every position along the offensive line. A leader in every sense of the word, Morse was a fixture along the offensive lines that changed the fortunes for Mizzou’s offense in 2013 and 2014. Morse was and is fantastic football player on the field, and an even better person off of it. - Brandon Kiley

Alyssa Munlyn

Some of Missouri’s best teams in the 2010s were known for their offense, but Munlyn stood out for her excellence as a defender too. By the time her four years ended, she topped Mizzou leaderboards in total blocks, block assists, blocks per set and hitting percentage. She joined Carly Kan and Lindsey Hunter as the only Tigers to ever garner four straight All-Region honors and became the first to ever be named to four straight AVCA All-America and All-SEC teams. In a decade where the volleyball program went to new heights in the SEC, Munlyn capped the 2010s as one of the most dominant forces to ever grace the hardwood. — Josh Matejka

Cierra Porter

COLLEGE BASKETBALL: JAN 06 Women’s Missouri at Tennessee

This feels like it could be an honorable mention for all the Porters who were sidelined by injuries, but Cierra Porter was the most productive in her time at Mizzou. Cierra was a key member for four of the best seasons in Mizzou women’s basketball history, and averaged over 13 points per game as a sophomore, before knee injuries caught up and slowed her down. But her contributions when healthy are worthy of being remembered. — Sam Snelling

Jontay Porter

SEC Basketball Tournament - Second Round

Talking about the Porter legacy at Missouri is impossible without talking about what could have been, but Jontay Porter’s play as a freshman showed exactly the kind of ceiling most viewers hoped he’d realize in entirety his sophomore year. A playmaking center, Porter stretched the floor with threes, blocked shots, and rebounded in helping Missouri patch over the loss of his older brother Michael, and lead the Tigers back to the NCAA tournament. — Sam Snelling

Phil Pressey

Phil Pressey’s tenure at Missouri can often be looked at as ‘What Might Have Been’ considering the way 2012 ended, and Mike Dixon being kicked off the team the following year. Pressey was a gifted passer and is the top assist man in Mizzou history. holding the school record for assists in a game, season, and career... and he left for the NBA after three years. — Sam Snelling

RiCardo Ratliffe

Big 12 Basketball Tournament - Baylor v Missouri

The 2011-12 Mizzou Basketball team was one of the best in school history because of its guard play, but also because they had RiCardo Ratliffe in the middle. Ratliffe was an undersized post who had a preternatural ability to score over bigger competition using a variety of angles and hook shots. He also set a school record at 69.3% from the floor his senior season. — Sam Snelling

Sheldon Richardson

Sheldon Richardson made quite an impact in only two years with the Mizzou football program. After taking a JuCo detour, the #4 recruit in nation out of high school and #1 recruit in state of MO amassed 37 tackles, including 8.0 TFLs and 2 QB sacks in 13 games (including 2 starts) in his first season. In 2012, he more than doubled his tackles (75), and had 10.5 TFLs and 4 QB sacks to go along with 3 forced fumbles. After a very productive season, Sheldon decided to forgo his final year of eligibility and was drafted in the first round, pick 13 - the first defensive tackle taken - by the New York Jets. The 2013 NFL Defensive Rookie of the Year and 2014 Pro Bowler is a productive NFL tackle for the Browns today. — Karen Steger

Kassius Robertson

What can we say about Kassius from Canisius? My favorite Canadian has to be one of the single greatest grad transfers in Mizzou history, and he stole our hearts with his silky smooth three-point shooting stroke — who in their right mind thought he’d be that good? Cuonzo Martin needed Kash to be great, and man— was he. He learned an entirely new offense, became a combo guard, and faced tougher competition than he ever did in the MAAC, but he took it all in stride, and left Mizzou good enough to be in the running for SEC Player of the Year, won First Team All-SEC, and now is lighting up the court professionally in Germany. — Karen Steger

Michael Sam

Overlooked two star prospect out of high school. “Too small and too slow.” Rotational player with high energy in 2010 and 2011. Spot starter in 2012. Tied the school record for sacks in 2013 and was named SEC Defensive Player of the Year. 1st Team All-SEC, 1st Team All-American. First openly gay man drafted in the NFL. Recipient of the Arthur Ashe Courage Award. Not bad for a kid out of Hitchcock, TX. — Nate Edwards

Michael Scherer

Mike was the heir apparent for Andrew Wilson in 2013 when he was busy knocking fools around on special teams as a backup. He became a starter in 2014 and was either first or second on the team in total tackles every year after. Much like his replacement, Cale Garrett, we were robbed of a last full year of Scherer, but as a leader and a physical impact on the field he was second to none. — Nate Edwards

TJ Sikkema

Another competitive balance pick in the 2019 MLB Draft, TJ Sikkema’s dominance on the mound encapsulates how well the program’s pitching staffs have come together under Steve Bieser. Sikkema’s 1.32 ERA in 2019 ranked third in the country, and his 258 career strikeouts ranks sixth in Missouri history, despite him playing just three seasons. If any Tiger deserves to be on this list, it’s the one that legitimately (probably) struck fear in SEC opponents. — Ryan Herrera

Aldon Smith

There is a version of Aldon Smith that we should all remember— no, not the most recent one. I’m talking about the one so full of talent and toughness that you just knew he would become a star. Mizzou faithful will remember him though as the guy with the (still) broken fibula intercepting a pass against #1 Oklahoma and returning it 58 yards to set up a Mizzou TD. That is the Aldon Smith that we should all remember. The former first round pick (#7 overall), one of the best pass rushers of his class, part of the acclaimed D-Line Zou, and as an NFL rookie— a first-team All-Pro, a Pro Bowler, and an integral part of the 49ers Super Bowl run. — Karen Steger

Ja’Mari Ward

The jumper. Ja’Mari Ward is good at jumping. He’s the reigning 2019 US Champion in the Long Jump from the most recent USATF Outdoor Championships, and winner of the SEC Outdoor Championship in the same event. He’s also good at jumping indoors, being named First Team All-American for the indoor long jump, and was named to the Indoor All-SEC Freshman Team. And oh yeah, he’s not done yet. — Karen Steger