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ST. LOUIS — Dennis Gates’ fourth season as Missouri basketball’s head coach ended the same way as Year 3.
The 10-seeded Tigers are heading back to Columbia after an 80-66 loss to 7-seed Miami in the first round of the NCAA Tournament on Friday at Enterprise Center. The Tigers have made the tournament in three of Gates’ four seasons at the helm, but his lone win in March Madness remains a first-season victory over Utah State in 2023.
Mizzou tracked Miami down from a 10-point lead to go in front with less than eight minutes to play, but the Hurricanes — who move on to face 2-seed Purdue — got the better of the Tigers in crunch time to survive the scare in front of a majority Missouri-leaning crowd and advance.
Here’s what Missouri basketball’s head coach said after the loss in St. Louis:
Mark Mitchell drilled a 3-pointer to give the Tigers the lead with 7:50 to play, a position the team held for just 71 seconds on Friday against Miami.
Mitchell pointed to his wrist as he ran back across the court, a packed-to-the-brim Enterprise Center on its feet and making enough noise to hear it 125 miles west in Columbia. Miami almost instantly called a timeout. The Tigers were close, but the push ended there.
Miami went on an 11-0 run. ForwardMalik Reneau scored five straight, and wing Sheldon Henderson drilled a wide-open wing 3-pointer to drive a dagger into the heart of Mizzou’s comeback attempt.
“What I saw happen in the final seven minutes, they hit some really — you know, when you take 30 minutes of the game and you defend at a high level, they ended up making a lot more 3s,” Gates said. “I believe that percentage really jumped up from the first half. They ended up shooting 30 percent in the first, 60 percent in the second.
“At the end of the day, it wasn't the second-chance (points) in the second half. It was the shooting percentage. So it was the tale of two different halves. We responded. We took the lead in the middle end of the second, but the most important part, we (weren’t) able to capitalize and get their shooting percentages down. They made a concerted effort to get to the paint and we (weren’t) able to build our wall accordingly.”
Miami made three shots from 3-point range in the final seven minutes. The Hurricanes scored 26 total points in that timespan to pull away.
The Hurricanes shot 11-of-24 from behind the arc, which is a 45.8% mark. Mizzou shot 10-of-28, which is 35.7%.
Mizzou lost four straight games to end the 2025-26 season. That’s the second straight year that the Tigers have limped to the finish line after losing five of their final six games in the 2024-25 campaign.
Did Mizzou, after going 6-2 from Jan. 31 through Feb. 28, again peak too early this season?
Why did the Tigers once more struggle to close the year with some better results?
“One possession away. I think one possession changes a season,” Gates said. “We had an opportunity to win the game on two shots against Arkansas at home. We were able to put our team in a position against Kentucky to take a late lead, wasn't able to hold onto it. But when you look at — and I'll do my job of dissecting this entire season, and the one thing that'll stand out to me, and I'll say this, is that we did not have the lead for more than five minutes of all those games. And when you are putting yourself in that position, whether you get down over a period of time or not, the management of it and it's just one play of execution, whether it's defensively or offensively.
“But that would be the common theme that I can strike up right now when you look at the box score. Like, tonight we only had the lead for one minute. That's tough. That's tough to do. And that's the consistency of when you look at each game in the last three weeks.”
"Our locker room hurts right now. I hurt right now. It's not easy. I'm sure there will be certain headlines. There will be certain tweets and certain voices out there saying that we failed. My guys hadn't failed anything," Gates said. "I'll stand on the train tracks for them every day, any day of the week anytime. My guys did not fail. If you want to say something about failing, say Dennis Gates failed. I'll take it any day of the week, with no hesitation, with my head high and protect our locker room like I've always done from a mental standpoint, emotional standpoint.
"And that's why they are likely to be successful, likely to run through a wall for us, and they'll always be welcome back to the city of CoMo and obviously welcome back as alumni of Missouri. So I'm proud of these guys, and as a coach, coaches come and go. Coaches come and go. But these players will always have a piece of Missouri in their hearts forever, and ultimately I'm proud of them."
This article originally appeared on Columbia Daily Tribune: What Dennis Gates said after Missouri’s first-round NCAA Tournament loss
Continue reading...
The 10-seeded Tigers are heading back to Columbia after an 80-66 loss to 7-seed Miami in the first round of the NCAA Tournament on Friday at Enterprise Center. The Tigers have made the tournament in three of Gates’ four seasons at the helm, but his lone win in March Madness remains a first-season victory over Utah State in 2023.
Mizzou tracked Miami down from a 10-point lead to go in front with less than eight minutes to play, but the Hurricanes — who move on to face 2-seed Purdue — got the better of the Tigers in crunch time to survive the scare in front of a majority Missouri-leaning crowd and advance.
Here’s what Missouri basketball’s head coach said after the loss in St. Louis:
Dennis Gates on Miami’s 11-0 run to pull away in last eight minutes
Mark Mitchell drilled a 3-pointer to give the Tigers the lead with 7:50 to play, a position the team held for just 71 seconds on Friday against Miami.
Mitchell pointed to his wrist as he ran back across the court, a packed-to-the-brim Enterprise Center on its feet and making enough noise to hear it 125 miles west in Columbia. Miami almost instantly called a timeout. The Tigers were close, but the push ended there.
Miami went on an 11-0 run. ForwardMalik Reneau scored five straight, and wing Sheldon Henderson drilled a wide-open wing 3-pointer to drive a dagger into the heart of Mizzou’s comeback attempt.
“What I saw happen in the final seven minutes, they hit some really — you know, when you take 30 minutes of the game and you defend at a high level, they ended up making a lot more 3s,” Gates said. “I believe that percentage really jumped up from the first half. They ended up shooting 30 percent in the first, 60 percent in the second.
“At the end of the day, it wasn't the second-chance (points) in the second half. It was the shooting percentage. So it was the tale of two different halves. We responded. We took the lead in the middle end of the second, but the most important part, we (weren’t) able to capitalize and get their shooting percentages down. They made a concerted effort to get to the paint and we (weren’t) able to build our wall accordingly.”
Miami made three shots from 3-point range in the final seven minutes. The Hurricanes scored 26 total points in that timespan to pull away.
The Hurricanes shot 11-of-24 from behind the arc, which is a 45.8% mark. Mizzou shot 10-of-28, which is 35.7%.
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On potentially peaking too early, and four-game losing streak to end year
Mizzou lost four straight games to end the 2025-26 season. That’s the second straight year that the Tigers have limped to the finish line after losing five of their final six games in the 2024-25 campaign.
Did Mizzou, after going 6-2 from Jan. 31 through Feb. 28, again peak too early this season?
Why did the Tigers once more struggle to close the year with some better results?
“One possession away. I think one possession changes a season,” Gates said. “We had an opportunity to win the game on two shots against Arkansas at home. We were able to put our team in a position against Kentucky to take a late lead, wasn't able to hold onto it. But when you look at — and I'll do my job of dissecting this entire season, and the one thing that'll stand out to me, and I'll say this, is that we did not have the lead for more than five minutes of all those games. And when you are putting yourself in that position, whether you get down over a period of time or not, the management of it and it's just one play of execution, whether it's defensively or offensively.
“But that would be the common theme that I can strike up right now when you look at the box score. Like, tonight we only had the lead for one minute. That's tough. That's tough to do. And that's the consistency of when you look at each game in the last three weeks.”
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Gates' final statement on the season
"Our locker room hurts right now. I hurt right now. It's not easy. I'm sure there will be certain headlines. There will be certain tweets and certain voices out there saying that we failed. My guys hadn't failed anything," Gates said. "I'll stand on the train tracks for them every day, any day of the week anytime. My guys did not fail. If you want to say something about failing, say Dennis Gates failed. I'll take it any day of the week, with no hesitation, with my head high and protect our locker room like I've always done from a mental standpoint, emotional standpoint.
"And that's why they are likely to be successful, likely to run through a wall for us, and they'll always be welcome back to the city of CoMo and obviously welcome back as alumni of Missouri. So I'm proud of these guys, and as a coach, coaches come and go. Coaches come and go. But these players will always have a piece of Missouri in their hearts forever, and ultimately I'm proud of them."
This article originally appeared on Columbia Daily Tribune: What Dennis Gates said after Missouri’s first-round NCAA Tournament loss
Continue reading...
