After a long week off following a convincing victory over a strong St. Mary’s team, Rick Barnes and the Horns finally kick off conference play with a road game in Columbia, Missouri. There are eight of us driving up there in just a few hours and the game has an awkward tip time of 12:45 tomorrow, so as a result you get the bonus of an early game preview.

The Longhorns have never lost a Big 12 opener in the nine years that Coach Barnes has led the team and Texas has a nine-game winning streak over the Tigers, but this one isn’t going to be easy. Mike Anderson has an experienced team now in their second year under his high-pressure system, and they can rattle teams into costly mistakes.

By the numbers

If you had one word to describe Mizzou, it would be pressure. But if you broke the rules and used a second word, it would be inconsistent. They’ve yet to put together 40 minutes of solid basketball yet, and as a result have fallen short in games against big competitors. The Tigers fell short against Michigan State in a virtual home game in Kansas City, and lost to Arkansas and California on the road. Their signature win on the year came against a Purdue team that is nothing better than a mid-pack Big 10 squad.

The high-pressure style that Mizzou plays has them pushing the tempo up to 75 possessions per game, the 12th-fastest rate in the country. But even at such a breakneck speed, the Tigers are still incredibly effective, with a +23.9 margin in Ken Pomeroy’s numbers.

They have the best three-point defense in the nation, but the ugly underbelly to that statistic is just how poor the Tigers are at defending the interior. When teams get past the perimeter pressure, they often find themselves with easy layups and bunnies.

The defense

It all starts with the defense for Mizzou. They love to put on full-court pressure following made baskets and free throws, so limiting their scoring serves another purpose beyond the obvious. Teams who attack the middle of the court with quick guards can often break the pressure and find themselves in a good transition situation with numbers. Texas has shown itself capable against pressing teams this season, but none have been as good at it as Missouri, save for perhaps Tennessee.

When the Longhorns manage to get it into the half-court set, more trouble awaits. Mike Anderson loves an extended 2-3 zone that is a really fun thing to watch. The pressure comes out nearly to midcourt, while players try to jump passing routes and unnerve shooters on the wings. Teams with quick ball movement can do really well against this look because of how far out the Tigers play, and Texas did a good job with that against the Mizzou zone last season.

When Mizzou shows a man look, their players oftentimes over-pursue in an effort to make the steal or anticipate a pass. This can lead to a lot of easy drives to the bucket or open jumpers, and you can be sure that Texas will take advantage of this if Mike Anderson tries it.

It’s also important for the younger guys to avoid the sidelines and corners, as the Tigers are great at immediately reacting and throwing a trap at an unlucky player who finds himself next to the out-of-bounds lines. I have complete faith in D.J. Augustin against this pressure, but if he happens to find himself in foul trouble, things could get dicey for A.J. Abrams or Justin Mason.

The players

Because of the frenetic pace at which they play, the Tigers can go nine deep without any problems.

Big man DeMarre Carroll was named Preseason Big 12 Newcomer of the Year after transferring from Vanderbilt, and he’s making an immediate impact for the tigers. Carroll leads the team with 14.8 points per game and 6.7 rebounds and is the key to getting the Missouri offense going in half-court sets. When the Tigers attack the paint with Carroll, they have tremendous success not only inside, but also with their freed-up guards on the perimeter. When they get frustrated against defenses who deny the entry pass or dribble penetration, they tend to settle for forced threes and waste a ton of possessions.

While Carroll gets most of the pub down low, Leo Lyons is the big who impresses me most on this team. He’s in the mold of a Damion James in that he can hit the mid-range jumper, he can rebound, and he can usually score inside. Those points in the paint are sometimes hard to come by for Lyons, which just so happens to sound a lot like James at times, too. The great thing about Leo’s nice J is that it allows him to blow by people from the triple threat position, resulting in a lot of easy buckets at the rack.

Stefhon Hannah is still around and even better than before. He’s the team’s second-leading scorer with 13.9 points, but is also doing a great job at distributing the ball from both the point and off-guard positions. He’s an incredibly quick guard who loves to attack defenses off the dribble and then react quickly to find the open men when they collapse. And did I mention he can hit the three? Hannah is the team’s leading man with 41% success from behind the arc.

After a really great start shooting the three last year, guard Matt Lawrence came down to Earth a bit in the second half of the year. This season, he’s still a solid threat behind the arc, but is hitting at a much more mortal rate of 37%. Lawrence is probably the worst on-the-ball defender that Mike Anderson plays, so whoever he is matched up with should get by him with ease.

Not at all blood related, but also a guard is Keon Lawrence who can also occasionally hit the three, but is a fairly streaky shooter from behind the arc. Like Hannah, this Lawrence is a really quick guard who is constantly in the face of his man and loves to penetrate off the dribble and react to what the defense gives him.

Although he doesn’t even start, Austin native Marshall Brown is still the captain and a strong voice in the huddle and locker room. He was the starting power forward last year for Mike Anderson, but now is doing well in his role as an energy guy off the bench. When the going gets tough, he likely won’t be the one taking the big shot, but he’s still the one the team looks to for leadership.

What to look for

Besides the obvious key of controlling the ball in this one, it is also going to be interesting to see how fatigue plays into things with Missouri able to dip much further into their bench for significant minutes. Dexter Pittman will be nearly useless in this high-tempo affair, but look for some more minutes from Alexis Wangmene, who Coach Barnes said has been showing some solid progress in practices the last week.

As always, it’s important to not fall behind early on the road and allow the crowd to fuel the home team. But for a Texas team that loves to sprint out of the gates in roadies and then wither in the second half, it’s going to be important to keep up that intensity for all forty minutes. The Tigers look to exhaust teams both physically and mentally, so it will take a lot of composure from what is still a pretty young Texas team. Luckily for Longhorn fans, these guys stared down much worse in Pauley Pavilion and came out on top.

This one is available to anybody who has the ESPN Full Court package, and it will air on KNVA for those folks in Austin. There are tons of affiliates carrying the game across the country, though, so be sure to check out the local affiliate list from TexasSports.com to find where it’s on in your area.

For now, we bid you adieu and hit the road for Columbia, Missouri. There may or may not be time (or internet access) to do a TV listing tomorrow morning, but we’ll try to at least get in a few short updates from the road on the iPhone.