Let’s look ahead to 2019-2020 SEC basketball

Happy Tuesday, y’all. It is absolutely dead on the Missouri beat right now, so there aren’t really any big headline narratives to recap.

However, this week’s news drought is the perfect time for us to drop a series from our esteemed Basketball Editor Matt Harris. It is this writer’s opinion that there is no finer writer on the Mizzou basketball beat, and yesterday, he started a five-parter on the returning players to SEC Basketball. In yesterday’s intro, he explained how it’s possible for us to somewhat accurately predict how players will perform.

We start by asking about the level of a player’s involvement and role in the rotation. Are they seeing lots of possessions? How do their minutes stack up against their teammates? And when they check in, how big of a role do they play? Fortunately, Hoop Lens and KenPom help us with accounting.

Matt’s writing, per usual, is both informative and down-to-earth, making everything not only digestible, but fun to learn! And if this sounds like a commercial... well, maybe it is! He’s a good writer! READ HIM!

But seriously, anyone itching for some basketball news should be all over this coming series. In it, Matt separates the SEC’s critical returning players into five tiers. He started with the headliners yesterday and will work his way through each one over the coming days.

Yesterday at Rock M

• Who are the SEC’s top returners?
• Rock M Radio: an interview with Hall of Fame basketball coach Jay Blossom

More Links:

• A few cool stories from ABC 17 News: Laurence Bowers is dedicating his summer basketball camp to a friend with breast cancer. And in case you missed it Sunday night, Andrew Kauffman talked with Mizzou soccer coach Bryan Blitz after the USWNT World’s Cup victory.
• Busy day at PowerMizzou where, in addition to Gabe’s Monday morning thoughts, Sean Williams talked with a 4-star 2020 wide receiver about his recruitment and analyst Matt Hamilton broke down some film on Mizzou’s latest recruit — all for premium subscribers.
• Also at Rivals (and also for premium subscribers), recent OU decommit and Mizzou target Dontae Manning talked about his ongoing recruitment.
• Jordan Barnett collected 5 points and 4 rebounds in last night’s NBA Summer League game against the Toronto Raptors. Kassius Robertson’s Hornets were also playing late into the night.
• Several current and former Mizzou track and field athletes will be competing at the World University Games in Italy this week.
• Apparently Drew Lock is having some growing pains in the NFL, where he’s currently behind Kevin Hogan for the Broncos’ backup QB job.