Entering his fourth season leading the Missouri Tigers, Dennis Gates has his team in a great position to do something this program hasn’t done in over a decade - make the NCAA Tournament in back-to-back seasons. It looked as if Gates was going to do this two seasons ago. However, after a couple of huge injuries and some regression by a couple of returning starters, the Missouri faithful were treated to one of the worst seasons in school history.
However, making the tournament last season has Mizzou fans looking forward to another season, one where the season ends in a long postseason run. While there is plenty to be excited about this offseason, there are some questions about what this next season will look like. Here are my three lingering questions going into the 2025-26 season:
1) Will there be a drop-off in 3-point shooting?
During Dennis Gates' tenure at Missouri, three-point shooting has become a solid measure of how good the team will be. In the two seasons that ended with trips to the NCAA Tournament, the Tigers were one of the top three-point shooting teams in the country. In year one, Missouri made 9.3 threes per game, hitting 36 percent from deep. And last season, year three, the Tigers made 8.7 threes per game, while improving their three-point percentage to 36.7. On the other end of that spectrum, in the disaster that was year two under Gates, Mizzou was one of the worst teams from deep. The Tigers averaged 7.3 made per game while only connecting on 31.9 percent.
This upcoming season, Missouri has a ton of options from behind the arc. Leading the charge will be Jacob Crews and Trent Pierce. Both saw plenty of success last year, though they weren’t nearly as consistent as one might have liked. Crews, a 36 percent career three-point shooter, made 33.6 percent from deep this past season. He provided some clutch threes for the Tigers in some big games, but a slow start to the season brought the ceiling down on what his role was in his first year in Columbia. Pierce, on the other hand, started off hot but faded a little down the stretch, but he was still a solid scorer from behind the arc, making 33 percent.
While having Crews and Pierce returning provides a solid base, Dennis Gates also brought in some solid deep threats to fill out the bench. Jevon Porter has seen mixed success from behind the arc over the past three seasons, hovering right around 30 percent the last two years. Porter saw his numbers sink as he took on a bigger role, so not being a primary or even secondary scorer should help his three-point percentage rise closer to the 35 percent he shot as a freshman.
Sebastian Mack is a capable deep threat, but that isn’t the strongest part of his offense. Mack shot 31.4 percent from three last season, though he only attempted 2.1 threes per game. While he doesn’t have to take all his shots from behind the arc, he does need to be more willing to shoot them.
Luckily for Mack, Dennis Gates added another guard this offseason who has no problem letting the deep ball fly. Jayden Stone saw his scoring numbers take a huge jump during his two seasons at Detroit Mercy, but at the same time, saw his three-point percentage drop 20 percent. As the secondary scorer, he made 51.9 percent from deep, making just over two threes per game. As the primary scorer, he took nearly four more threes per game and still made just over two. With Stone not being expected to be the team's entire offense, his efficiency numbers should rebound, providing Mizzou with a dynamic bench scorer.
The Tigers might not have multiple players hitting 40 percent from deep this upcoming season, but with how many solid shooters Dennis Gates has on the roster, Missouri should easily be able to keep pace with the three-point success of last season without much of a drop-off.
2) Can Anthony Robinson take another step forward?
One of the biggest surprises last season was how much Anthony Robinson improved from his freshman year. He nearly doubled his minutes, improved his shooting percentage by 12 percent, and improved his scoring average by more than five points per game. Simply put, Robinson improved at nearly every aspect of the game. His big leap forward was one of the big reasons that Missouri was as good as it was.
Another monster improvement likely isn’t in the cards for Robinson, but that doesn’t mean he can’t or won’t become a better player. Even with how well he played last season, there is still room for improvement on both ends of the court.
Offensively, Robinson still hasn’t reached his potential. He was a reliable scoring threat (9.0 ppg), but often deferred to his teammates to carry the scoring load. He turned into a good three-point shooter - making 40 percent last season - but he didn’t attempt many shots from behind the arc. He was a better scorer in the mid-range and in the paint, but a large portion of his scoring opportunities came from him making a solid defensive play. Another season in Dennis Gates’ system should only help Robinson improve. I wouldn’t be surprised if he finished the year averaging double-digit points, even if he doesn’t lead the team in scoring.
Speaking of defense, Robinson is at his best on the defensive end of the court. Last season, he averaged 2 steals per game, which was second best in the SEC - landing him with SEC All-Defense honors. Improvement on the defensive end of the court doesn’t necessarily mean more steals; for Robinson, it mostly means limiting dumb frustration fouls. Last year was his first year playing significant minutes, but in multiple games, he was parked on the bench in foul trouble - he fouled out three times (including the NCAA Tournament loss to Drake) and had four fouls 10 times. Gates clearly trusts his point guard, but if he doesn’t improve in that area, Robinson’s upside will be limited.
I guess the question should have been more Will he take another step forward than Can he, but no matter how you pose the question, I think the answer ends up being the same either way. Yes, Robinson can and will take another step forward, improving his game even more, though what that looks like will be up to Robinson and Dennis Gates.
3) Who will step up as the lead big man?
One of the more puzzling things about Dennis Gates’ tenure is his inability to land a traditional scoring big man. It's not that he hasn’t gone after one, though sometimes late in the transfer cycle, he just hasn’t landed one.
Gates has had pieces over the years, though the closest he’s gotten to a traditional big man was last season with Josh Gray. And while Gray provided some much-needed size and rebounding, it's a stretch to consider him an offensive threat. For Missouri, a traditional big man would be a luxury, not necessarily a need, with how fast-paced the offense plays. But that doesn’t mean that a solid big man wouldn’t help improve this team.
This season, Gates once again missed out on a scoring big man, but what he did add was plenty of depth in the frontcourt. Mizzou brought in Jevon Porter, Luke Northweather, and Shawn Phillips - though Northweather is usually uninterested in doing anything at the rim - who will all need to compete with Trent Burns, Mark Mitchell, and potentially Trent Pierce for post minutes. Right away, I’m confident that Northweather won’t be in the rotation as a post player. Through two seasons at Oklahoma, nearly all of his shots were from three. So having him play around the rim probably isn’t in his skill set.
So, of the transfers, that leaves Porter and Phillips to compete for the role. Porter, much like Northweather, operates on the perimeter most of the time, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t willing to mix it up in the paint. Over three seasons, Porter averages seven shots inside the arc, making nearly 50 percent of those shots. He’s also proven to be a good rebounder, averaging 7.2 per game in two of his three seasons out west. His ability to take on the role of the lead big will be determined by how well he holds up against bigger, more physical, SEC talent. Phillips, on the other hand, has all the skills of a traditional big man, though he won’t even consider stepping away from the basket to take a shot. His upside would be a little higher if he were a back-to-the-basket player, but most of his shots come from catching dump-off passes from driving guards. He is also a solid rebounder, 5.2 per game, though he probably won’t get much play if he doesn’t get more physical.
With Trent Burns’ slight frame and Trent Pierce being much more of a stretch forward, the only other reasonable option is Mark Mitchell. Even as an undersized big, Mitchell was excellent around the rim last season - making at least 50 percent from two in 20 games, including going 10/12 in a huge upset win over Alabama. The only concern about Mitchell being the lead big man is his health. He struggled a bit towards the end of the season with fatigue and injury, so having him operate full time in the post might not be what's best in the long term, though he has proved to be more than capable of dominating opponents when properly motivated.
I don’t know if Missouri will have a dominant post player this season, but I’m interested in seeing if Mark Mitchell can hold up at the rim and if Trent Burns can bring something that the Tigers haven’t seen in a few years. If not these two, the best option is Jevon Porter, though he has his concerns. Regardless of who steps up, having a solid big man can only make things easier for Gates and the Tigers. Though, as we’ve learned over the past few years, one isn’t a necessity for Missouri to have a successful season.