I had an enjoyable Saturday afternoon, watching Missouri go into Starkville and carpet-bomb Mississippi State with sharp three-point accuracy in an 88-61 wipeout of a staggered home team. For the Tigers the torrent of threes resulted in another impressive road win and left another home crowd silent and sad.

The victory was Mizzou’s second straight demolition in the state of Mississippi. On consecutive Saturdays, Missouri took down Ole Miss and Mississippi State in relatively stress-free competition.

The Tigers had a 12–point lead late in the game at Oxford and won by eight. In Starkville, Mizzou kindly allowed Mississippi State to take a 13-12 lead early on … and then outscored the Bulldogs 76-48 the rest of the way. With these back-to-back conquests, Missouri earned the Mississippi State championship on back-to-back conquests within the Magnolia State.

Saturday’s 27-point smashing became the Tigers’ largest margin of victory over a ranked team – on the road – in program history. And this latest success was Missouri’s fourth over an AP Top 25-ranked opponent this season – which includes the wins at Florida and at Starkville.

Missouri is making a rather remarkable comeback from last season’s kneecapping by SEC opponents. Last season the Tigers famously went 0-18 in conference play, becoming the second battered SEC squadron to go winless in league play during the shot-clock era, which commenced in 1985-86. The only other winless campaign was endured by Vanderbilt, which flunked all 18 tests in 2018-2019.

How does a coach recover from 0-18?

Well, Mizzou’s Dennis Gates is offering a master class on the subject.

+ Mizzou is 17-4 overall, and 6-2 in the SEC.

+ I don’t pay much attention to the weekly AP Top 25 poll, but for the record the Tigers are ranked 15th in the nation this week.

+ I’m more into the cold metrics-based ratings. As of Monday morning, Mizzou was rated No. 16 in the land by Bart Torvik, No. 23 at KenPom, and No. 21 at NCAA Net.

+ Since Mizzou opened SEC play on Jan. 4, they’re the No. 5 team in the nation according to the Bart Torvik metrics. The only four teams rated higher than Mizzou since Jan. 4 are Houston, Purdue, Auburn and Duke. S

+ KenPom currently has Missouri listed as the third-best team in the SEC behind Auburn and Alabama and projects a final conference record of 12-6. And since Jan. 4, Torvik rates Mizzou as the SEC’s No. 2 team behind Auburn.

+ Torvik has Missouri holding an in-progress resume that’s similar to several notable teams of the past including 2014 UConn, which won the national championship. And 2013 Marquette and 2022 Arkansas,which each advanced to the Elite Eight.

+ As of now Torvik’s model projects Mizzou entering the 2025 NCAA Tournament as a No. 4 seed.

All of this, coming after 0-18?

“We knew they were a really good basketball team before the ball was tipped,” Mississippi coach Chris Jans told the media after Saturday’s shellacking. “I told everybody that would listen to me that they’re the best team in the country, not just the SEC, that nobody is talking about.”

Mississippi State offers a good measure of just how far Mizzou has come in a year.

Last season blew out Missouri by 24 at Mizzou Arena.

This year, Gates and his merry men went into Mississippi State’s building and won by 27.

Jans is correct about the perception of Mizzou being off base compared to the reality of Mizzou. I know this because I follow the point spreads. I don’t make any bets (not yet) but I love to study point-spread trends in an attempt to gauge what the public is generally missing in terms of underrating some teams and overrating others.

When I saw Missouri listed as a 6 and ½ point underdog for Saturday’s session at Starkville, I texted my brother with a smiley-face emoji and told him to invest in Mizzou because the point spread was laughable. My text included two words: “Free money.” (As a Maryland resident, he can legally bet on games.)

Needless to say, Missouri had no problem covering the 6 and ½ point spread. Mizzou obliterated it.

In a related note, Missouri is now 7-1 against the spread in SEC games.  Casual bettors still haven’t caught onto the Tigers. They must be thinking, just a little, about that 0-18 season. But the sharp bettors – who picked up on Mizzou early – are enjoying the payoffs in their investments in an overlooked Missouri team.

After writing about Missouri’s ability to dominate the three-point shooting matchup so far in SEC games, betting-trends analyst Jeff Fogle had this to say about the importance of MU’s three-point authority in his outstanding Substack newsletter:

“It’s not just (made shots.) It’s literally owning the arc in almost every game,” Fogle wrote. “That’s how you start 6-2 straight up in an elite power league. That’s how you go 7-1 against the spread if nobody’s realizing how well you’re performing in this important element.”

Gates isn’t 17-4 overall with a .750 winning percentage in the nation’s toughest college basketball conference because he’s hitting the weekly lottery.

1. Coach had five players returning from the 0-18 lost cause that wasn’t really a lost cause. Gates believed in Tamar Bates, Caleb Grill, Trent Pierce, Anthony Robinson and Aidan Shaw. He wanted them to stay and they stayed. He was confident that they’d get better and they did. There was no panic or freaking out. Gates’ immense poise and inner confidence was just what a coach needs to rebound from 0-18.

2. Gates is excellent at sorting through the transfer portal to find great fits for its roster based on his preferred style of play. So with a strong base of returning players, Gates went to the portal to secure help from Mark Mitchell, Tony Perkins, Josh Gray, Marques Warrick and Jacob Crews.

3. Gates had another good recruiting class, and is developing a new set of freshmen that includes guard T.O. Barrett, center Peyton Marshall and power forward Marcus Allen.

4. This splendid mix of returning players, incoming transfers and freshmen recruits has given Missouri exceptional depth. This season 41.6 percent of the team’s total minutes played have been supplied by players coming off the bench. At KenPom that percentage ranks 15th nationally among 364 Division 1 teams.

5. Missouri has excellent balance in most areas of the all-around game. Via KenPom, the Tigers are 13th nationally in adjusted offensive efficiency and 43rd in adjusted defense. They’re 15th nationally in effective field-goal percentage (56.6%). They’re aggressive in attacking the basket to draw fouls and make frequent trips to the free-throw line. Missouri’s ratio of free throw attempts (FTA) to field goal attempts (FGA) is the second-best in the nation.

6. Mizzou’s point distribution makes it hard to defend the Tigers. Made three-pointers represent 32.4 percent of MU’s points scored. Two-point shots are responsible for 43.7 percent of the overall point production. And free throws have produced 24% of their total points scored. That 24 percent point share on free throws is the 11th best in the nation. And Missouri is always a threat to fetch missed shots of any variety; the team ranks 90th (among 364 D-1 members) in its percentage of offensive rebounds (33%) on misses.

7. Winning the three-point shooting contest is a significant factor in Missouri’s 6-2 mark in the SEC. The Tigers have connected for 10 or more three-pointers in six of eight conference games. No other SEC team has done that as many times as Mizzou has in conference play. The Tigers have hit on 23 more three-point baskets than their SEC opponents, and that includes a 70-44 advantage in made threes in their six conference victories.

8. This season, Caleb Grill’s 49 percent shooting percentage on threes ranks sixth in the nation among 2,281 players (according to KenPom). And only one power-conference shooter – Wisconsin’s Kamari McGee – has a higher three-point success rate (54%) than Grill. But it should be pointed out that Grill has attempted twice as many treys (100) than McGee (50.) And Tamar Bates’ 39.5 percent success on three-point balls puts him 304th among 2,288 D-1 shooters that are eligible for the rankings. That puts him in the 87th percentile, which is fantastic.

9. And it’s a similar advantage for Mizzou in the free-throw contest. The Tigers have made 22 more free throws than opponents in their eight conference games. And in their six conference wins, the Tigers have popped 17 more free throws than the other side. These margins in made threes and free throws really add up.

10. Tamar Bates is prominent nationally in three areas. I’ve already mentioned Bates and his successful aim on three pointers. But he’s also No. 149 among 2,288 D-1 players in two-point shot percentage, which puts him in the 94th percentile. And Bates has made 55 of 58 free-throw attempts this season; his .948 percentage is second best among 2,288 D-1 players. Oh, and speaking of free throws, Mark Mitchell has the 19th-best ratio nationally in the ratio of free-throw attempts to field-goal attempts.

Coach Gates has put this all together with a refined touch and keen instincts. He knew what he needed to do. And he knew how to go do it. And do it fast … but with precision. Because of this, Gates has a chance to make history this season.

During the shot-clock era (1985-86) through the 2023-2024 season, 17 power-conference teams suffered through winless seasons in conference play. How did those teams recover? Well, first of all, eight of the 17 coaches in charge of those teams were fired during or after the winless season. The 17 winless-season programs collectively had a .238 winning percentage in conference action in the follow up season.

One of those winless teams, Iowa State, made the NCAA Tournament in the 2021-2022, the “rebound” season with a new coach in place. T.J. Otzelberger has done a terrific job at Iowa State, but he had a losing record in conference action (7-11) in his first season.

In 2004-2005, Texas A&M had a 8-8 conference record under coach Billy Gillespie after he was put in charge of an Aggies that went 0-14 in the Big 12 the year before. That was pretty strong work, but it doesn’t apply in a comparison to Gates. Same with Otzelberger. That’s because the two coacjes didn’t bring their own teams back from a winless season; they took over someone else’s team and had a clean slate.

That can be a lot easier than trying to dig out with the same players you recruited and coached. This obviously wasn’t a problem for Gates. He just coached up his returning players, found the right talent in the transfer portal, and added freshmen recruits.

Until this season during the shot-clock era, the best a winless conference coach could do for a follow-up record was Miami of Florida coach Leonard Hamilton, who raised the Hurricanes to a 9-9 ACC mark in 1994-95. Hamilton later moved to Florida State, where he mentored a young prodigy of an assistant coach named Dennis Gates.

When I did a video about this late last week some Mizzou fans said I needed to update the video because I didn’t talk about how Gates – unlike the coaches who led teams before the transfer-portal window opened in the fall of 2018 – had an advantage that the other coaches didn’t have.

Sorry, y’all might want to discredit Gates … which come to think of it is kinda strange if you’re really a Mizzou fan. But I don’t have to go along with the pettiness.

Sure, Gates had the advantage of recruiting talent through the portal. But doesn’t that work both ways? Coaches also lose talent through the portal, correct?

And what about all of the horrendous power-conference programs that are still trying to raise on up out of a daunting ditch, several seasons after the transfer portal went into effect in a full season for the first time since 2019-2020?

Here are some of the winning percentages (in conference games) since the start of the 2019-2020 season:

DePaul .152
Georgetown .202
California, .275
Georgia, .283
Minnesota, .291
Nebraska, .308
Oregon State, .315
Boston College, .350
Ole Miss, .354
Washington, .361
Oklahoma, .375
Butler, .376
Utah .393

And there are a bunch of others with in-conference winning percentages that range from .404 to .427. That list includes West Virginia, Georgia Tech, Oklahoma State, Louisville, Oklahoma, Penn State, Notre Dame, and Miami (FLA.)

Some of the programs are starting to make real progress this season. But I still have to say this: But if the transfer portal and NIL makes it such a snap to take a winless conference team and turn it into a success less than a year later … then why aren’t more coaches and programs are doing this as quickly as Dennis Gates at Mizzou? Huh? Any answers? Didn’t think so. Don’t worry about it; just enjoy the season for the joyful comeback that it is.

Gates is in position to become the first power-conference coach during the shot-clock era to take a winless conference team (0-18) and turn it into a winning conference team the following year. KenPom projects a 12-6 finish for the Tigers. And even if Gates comes close to that – say 10-8 – he’d still be the first coach to pull it off during this era.

And on top of that, Mizzou has an excellent chance to make it to the NCAA Tournament as an at-large team. I’m not saying the Tigers can’t win the SEC Tournament. But if they don’t, Bart Torvik gives them a 100% shot at getting in with an at-large invitation.

That can change, of course. But considering what happened last season – 0-18! – we’re seeing a special season, a unique season – from an excellent coach. Any attempt to discredit Gates at this stage of the season, with what he’s done so far … good grief, this is not only irrational – but it qualifies as loony-tunes stuff.

Thanks for reading …

And please pardon my typos.

I have a bad keyboard these days. It’s driving me batty.

–Bernie