Chat Mizzou sports with Dave Matter at 11 a.m. Thursday
Bring your Tigers football, basketball and recruiting questions, and talk to Mizzou beat writer Dave Matter in a live chat at 11 a.m. Thursday.
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Dave
Few questions for you,
1) With the recent uptick of Missouri State and SLU, do you see any added pressure for these schools to play? MSU and Mizzou women are both normally top 25 teams and play every year. What is stopping the men?
2) With KU always a top 25 team and Illinois back to top national stage, what do you make of Mizzou getting to play them every year just like old times. -
I'll start with No. 2. Missouri and Illinois do play every year and plan to keep that series alive every season. Mizzou and Kansas have a six-year series that was supposed to start this year and instead will begin next season.As for playing SLU, Martin and Travis Ford have both gone on record saying they expect to start a series eventually. No telling when. MU offered to play SLU in a three-game series with two games in Columbia but SLU didn't go for that. Mizzou and Missouri State had been in dissuasions to play this year, in Springfield, I believe, but that game fell apart once COVID started altering everyone's schedules. Matin didn't want to play Missouri State when his good friend Paul Lusk was coaching there, but that's no longer the case. -
Congrats to Dru Smith and Tilmon for SEC recognition. Wonderful year for both them. It certainly reflects well on both them and the program. Dru Smith coming in from a mid-major and seeing Tilmon start as a shaky freshman the two have surpassed my expectations.
CM has done a very good helping these young men reach this level of performance. -
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Given how COVID has altered conference tournaments thus far, the latest victim being Duke, do you know what the NCAA’s protocol is when a team has a positive test. In conference tournaments, if a team has had a positive test they’ve had to forfeit. A lot of schools of have been upset by this protocol, which I believe have been established by the conferences and not the NCAA, but that does merit the question of how the NCAA will handle it. For example, say Gonzaga is a 1 seed and is playing a 16 seed (someone like Mt. Saint Mary’s) and Gonzaga had a positive test. Would Gonzaga have to forfeit, or would the game be delayed? I don’t know how flexible the NCAA is willing to be, but I wouldn’t be surprised if this is an issue at least once.
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I wrote about this a couple weeks ago. Once the field of 68 is set on Sunday, teams unable to play because of COVID can be replaced within 48 hours, but after the deadline passes Tuesday evening, no more replacement teams. In that case, using your example, Mt. St. Mary's would advance by forfeit.There will be four teams on stand-by as the replacement teams should someone have to pull out of that tournament during that 48-hour window Sunday through Tuesday.
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I’m catching up on the chat, and that is interesting how the NCAA will handle Covid positives. I will follow up Bradley’s question and scenario with this: what if Gonzaga finds out Monday night they have positives tests and will not be able to play. Will that shift the entire tournament (as in the 2 seed is the new 1 seed, 3 seed as 2 seed, etc.), or will a previously non-tournament team now be a 1 seed?
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It depends if the team that has to be replaced is from a one-bid conference. If there are no other West Coast Conference teams in the field of 68, then the West Coast Conference would select the replacement for Gonzaga to play as the No. 1 seed. The rest of the bracket won't change one bit.Now, in this case, the WCC will have another team in the field, BYU. So if it's a team from a multi-bed league that must be replaced, then the NCAA goes to the four teams on stand-by.Here's what I wrote a few weeks back:
A single-bid conference may replace its automatic qualifier if it’s unable to play in the tournament because of COVID-19 cases based on the league’s approved contingency replacement policy. The replacement team will take the place of its fellow conference team in the same place on the bracket.
For conferences with multiple teams in the field, if COVID knocks a team out of the tournament, the replacement team will come from the NCAA selection committee’s first four teams not selected for at-large bids, as rated Nos. 1 through 4. Any of the four replacement teams that aren’t added to the NCAA field would still be a No. 1 seed for the first round of the National Invitation Tournament, starting March 17-20.
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He'd have to enter the portal first and I haven't heard that as a possibility.He's a great example of a player who wasn't considered a high-major recruit in high school who developed into a great mid-major player who could probably help just about any high-major team.
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Having seen what the pandemic did to the Blues last year and the crazy schedule the Cardinals endured I think the basketball team has done a wonderful job of avoiding positive tests and keeping their wits about them in a very unusual and challenging year (just look at Duke). Not an easy thing for young men in a college environment. Regardless of the tourney outcomes they should feel good about some significant achievements.
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The basketball team certainly had some positive tests before the season. As I wrote in yesterday's P-D, Cuonzo Martin had the virus before the season. Others, too. As I wrote yesterday - and I don't think this had been reported anywhere else - but the positive case that forced MU to miss two games in January turned out to be a false positive.
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He's definitely got some guys ahead of him on the depth chart. Martez Manuel will be a starter. The staff really seems to like J.C. Carlies at safety. Chris Shearin is getting first-team work at safety right now. Jalani Williams comes back from injury this summer. Drinkwitz certainly loves Robinson's leadership and approach and professionalism, but he's just six practices into learning a new defensive system after playing quarterback his whole life. There's going to be a steep learning curve.As for being a team candidate, I think he'd be great in that role. Others I'd expect to be captain candidates: Case Cook, Mike Maietti, Keke Chism, Connor Bazelak, Barrett Banister, Kobie Whiteside, Manuel.
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Yes, a limited capacity is allowed in the arena.I'm staying downtown near the arena and walked to a restaurant last night. The restaurant where I ate was full, but tables were spaced apart, so the capacity was much lower than normal. There are far fewer people walking the downtown streets compared to past years. I didn't venture onto Broadway, but I don't think there's nearly as much action in the honky tonks these days.
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Not in a long time. Gary Pinkel hired him to work in the weight room so he could be around the program, but Justin didn't stick around very long. Barry Odom and Justin are very close, and Barry had Justin talk to the team during preseason camp in his first year as head coach, but he didn't have an active role with the team. He keeps himself busy with his kids these days.
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There were some internal issues with McKinney. He was never going to work out in this program. I gave him and his side a chance to explain what happened, why he was suspended before he eventually left the team on his own but they declined to comment. He wasn't kicked off the team per se but had he not left on his own I don't believe he would have been allowed to stay on the team. He announced a few weeks ago that he would announce his next school on March 15. It won't be Missouri.
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