Everything coach Dennis Gates said after Mizzou’s win over Eastern Washington

Missouri men’s basketball earned its second straight win of the season, this time over the Eastern Washington Eagles in an 84-77 game.

Graduate guard Caleb Grill was the star of the show, dropping a career-high 33 points on 10-for-13 shooting and 8-for-10 shooting from behind the arc. Behind him were junior forward Mark Mitchell’s 13 points on 6-for-10 shooting.

Opening Statement:

“We wanted to play teams that had a chance to win their conference. My former teammate Shantay Legans got this job at Eastern Washington years ago, his first head coaching job. He’s now the head coach at Portland and I’ve watched that program close, very close, very, very close, and the success that they’ve had over the last, let’s say, eight years has been great. Now you bring in a Hall of Fame coach, the person who got Gonzaga going didn’t get any credit for it, but he gave Gonzaga a kickstart. I thought our guys did a great job after the 12-4 start. It showed our character from top to bottom. We made some adjustments and I thought our guys were able to execute the game plan for four of the thirty minutes in the second half. Like good teams, we knew they were going to be on the run, but again, our guys responded in a way that I thought showed character. showed and showed growth from one game to the next, and you can see us slowly moving in the right direction. So I’m thankful for our crowd that showed up, and I’m thankful for a win.”

About Grill’s performance:

“I benched him, he was mad at me and he reacted. It’s that simple. We hugged and made up, but I benched him. Responsibility is growth, and he allowed me held him accountable. And certain things are expected of us.” guys, and that’s a sign that we can go in the right direction. He didn’t fight it, he accepted everything. And I guarantee if you ask him whether you want to start now or not, he’ll say he’s fine. So thank you Caleb.”

About the start of Missouri and the cutting of Eastern Washington:

“I think when you make the adjustment, it makes it a little bit difficult from the point of view of having hot hands, passing or areas of operation. We pushed them deep, pushed their attack further out on the field. At the peremitter we were able to get deflections getting It didn’t give them the same passing angles as in the first half. So geometrically you take away the angles This is one of the best cutting teams in the country, and they play well the energy they put into the ball moving it But More importantly, it’s something we’ll continue to learn from putting pressure on our defense from the weak side, because like Mark said, it’s a lot of unique patterns. They went in front of their guards a lot, and they found cutters. And when you have that type of first offense, it puts pressure on the basket. I thought we would have done better not having empty possessions. Those empty possessions mean we get stops and then we try a home run game to make and turn it over. I thought it made our guys feel good and connected in a way. They didn’t let the running frustrate them, and they grew and they grew and hey grew. I thought that was a sign of maturity. “I’m just thankful that those guys were able to speak up and also respond in a certain way to close out the game.”

About Grill’s leadership:

“Caleb has put pressure on himself and he’s eager to get back. That’s why the Memphis game went the way it did, and that’s obviously why I took him out of the lineup, because he didn’t focused on his leadership. Once he focused, he didn’t focus on his leadership.” on his leadership and not on success, (it) means the ball goes in the basket. That means the ball now goes into the basket because that’s not his concentration because it’s the end because he’s playing all great put emphasis on the defensive side. He took the shots his teammates created for him, and ultimately he was in the right spot. What does that mean? But even when Look at the grace in our program, Caleb allowed his teammates to hold him accountable. He allowed his parents, and I thank his parents during the process, because we know how much pressure he put on himself. They did a great job and we had conversations to make sure he took away the highlight of basket making. And once he stopped thinking like that, voila, the basket suddenly grew, and that’s exactly the pressure young people face. Mark Mitchell has also been able to make and provide some incredible plays. I thought he did a great job getting to the foul line early. Both guys down the stretch need to focus and knock down the free throws that I know they’ve done consistently, and that’s where that helped their run. It helped Memphis’ run in the second half. “Obviously it helped us close the game against a strong Howard team, and tonight it helped us close the game because they stepped back to make free throws.”

On the performance of Washington’s Andrew Cook:

“I thought he did a great job. If you look at Cook’s numbers, he was a guy who made zero threes in the last game and had 20 plus points tonight. He made one three. It shows how he scores. He’s great at moving without the ball His teammates are great at delivering the ball clearly on time I said great coach as we all know and I thought it was an NCAA tournament team we were playing And obviously am I’m proud that our guys show character and growth along the way. Then you graduate and you get better. You see different roles change. When you see guys coming up, it becomes someone’s night committee. The magic word is selflessness, and that’s ultimately where we are. have to focus on when it comes to going out there and playing. I thought Jacob Crews gave us incredible minutes defensively. He’s picked up a few steals. His junior college teammate is Nick McClain. They both played at Daytona, but I thought Crews jumped in, made timely three and his energy was contagious. These are things that we have to continue to use our boys for.”

On Trent Pierce’s absence:

“In terms of minutes, I thought they had a big body, but also a weak side defense, which they killed us with and I just wanted to go with the guys. I think Marcus Allen deserved the minutes he got. I thought that Jacob Crews deserved those minutes. When I start thinking about the game, you have to look back at training and stuff like that. Once I saw that he wasn’t going to be in the game that first half just because of the rotation on that moment I really just focused on what I needed to focus on with the guys, and we finished the game with a certain group.”

For a half-court violation:

“These are things we have to get better at, and it starts with me. I think the next break after Thursday’s game will be a week where we can install different things and now continue to stretch and work on execution. If games come as quickly as they come, they have more time to prepare for us than we had to prepare for them. If you have that on your schedule, you should be able to continue with the things you’ve been working on .instead of just throwing new things at your guys. You don’t want them to be paralyzed by the scouting report, and you just have to focus and work things out as the calendar allows.”

About Marcus Allen and Anthony Robinson II:

“Marcus Allen and Ant Robinson are two unique players. They’re both great defensively. Their defensive IQ is way above their offensive IQ. And when we recruited them, you have to understand these are the same plays they made, whether it was AAU .” They always jump into the ball at eight in the morning. Defensively, they do the right things, and those are the things that come out uniquely when they just try to be themselves. I thought Ant let the offensive end affect them a little bit where he made a few fadeaways. But from a defensive perspective, these are two experienced defensive guys with high basketball IQs. I truly believe one of those two will be an SEC Defensive Player of the Year one day. I believe in their defensive side of the ball, but also that their teammates could get to the right spots as well. But I’m going to watch the film and look back at the things we need to work on, I’m sure. There’s a lot that we’re still in the early stages of this team, but there’s also a lot of room to grow and a lot of room to improve defensively and get better offensively.”