On paper, the Missouri Tigers won yet another game last night in a magical season no one saw coming. A closer look, however, and anyone who watched last night’s very close 67-66 win over Texas knows just how easily it could have went the other way. Thus the wise words from Frank Haith to his team — and specifically Michael Dixon — were the ones perfectly suited for the moment.
“There is no time to panic and no time to stress.”
Dixon heeded his words with an incredible offensive performance overall last night with 21 points that won the game for the Tigers. Better yet, he responded in the final minute to help the Tigers retake the lead after it seemed Texas was going to topple the Big 12 powers in yet another heartbreaking loss on the road.
Haith’s squad lost last week to Oklahoma State unexpectedly and it showed just how vulnerable even the best teams can be when stuck in the grind of conference road games.
“Coach has been stressing growth from the OSU game and kind of how we let that game slip away,” Missouri’s Kim English said after the game. “We always stayed true to that. We talked about late in games two things have to be consistent — defensive stops and offensive execution.”
Missouri learned something both in the loss and in last night’s close win. They’ll hope to continue to develop as they face tough games ahead, including the big match-up on Saturday against the Big 12 leading Kansas Jayhawks.