Women’s basketball follows typical trends entering conference play
To the everyday Missouri fan, the first half of the women’s basketball season may seem promising. With conference play looming, a naïve onlooker might say the women are poised to succeed and end their streak of low seeds in the Big 12 Tournament.
But when you compare Missouri’s performance thus far to previous seasons and other teams in the Big 12, the only thing they’re poised for is mediocrity.
Before I go on, let me shed light on the few bright spots non-conference play has brought for the Tigers.
First, there is the emergence of sophomore forward Christine Flores. Now fully healthy, she is on her way to being a big player for the next few years. Second, the Tigers have shown a new found ability to close out games after earning the early lead.
There are also some aspects of the 2009-10 season that seem hopeful, but are actually useless in predicting how the rest of the year will go.
First, there is the “strong” 10-3 overall record. Upon deeper investigation, this is nothing to get excited about. Not only have the Tigers had almost the same non-conference record in the past three seasons, but so does every team in the Big 12 thanks to easy competition. On top of that, Missouri came up short in the important match-ups like Memphis and Xavier.
Next you could say they are outscoring their opponents well, and their margin of victory has increased from the first half of last season. But in reality, the Tigers are a distant tenth in the Big 12 in points per contest. The truth is every team looks good at this point in the year.
Missouri opens Big 12 play at Colorado this Saturday at 1 p.m. The Buffaloes share Missouri’s 10-3 record in non-conference games.