Mizzou Basketball: Michael Porter Jr is back on the court

This is not a drill Mzzou Basketball fans, Michael Porter Jr will be playing in the first round of the SEC Tournament.

Now I know as a Mizzou fan it’s hard to believe something good will actually happen to our team. There is a long history of frustration at Mizzou from the Third Down Game to Norfolk State to the Flea Kicker and so on. That frustration continued into this season when Michael Porter Jr was injured in the first game of the year, playing only two minutes.

This time is different though. The number one recruit in the country is about to make his national debut for the entire country to see. He’ll be a lead story on all the major sports networks and be the talk of college basketball. For the first time in program history, all of that attention will be on a player from Mizzou.

The excitement in Mizzou country is electric as they have been anticipated this announcement for weeks, but that expectation with that excitement are under control.

I haven’t seen anyone say they have big expectations for Porter, especially not in his first game. All anyone wants to see tonight is that Porter plays his 20 minutes and comes out as healthy as he went in. Hopefully he fits nicely into the rotation and can show some flashes of what made him so highly recruited.

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It’s video packages like that and highlights from his high school days circulating that makes it hard for anyone inside or outside the program to not dream. While most Missouri fans will be happy making the dance and winning one game, knowing the lineup we can put on the floor they are capable of more.

They could have a starting lineup of 6’10 Porter Jr, 6’11 Jontay Porter, 6’10 Jeremiah Tilmon, 6’7 Jordan Barnett and 6’3 Kassius Robertson. I don’t know many other lineups in the country who can put that much height and talent on the floor at the same time. It’s a lineup that screams matchup nightmare in the big dance.

But we are getting ahead of ourselves. Right now all that matters is that Porter Jr is playing against Georgia. Mizzou played Georgia back on January 10th at Mizzou Arena in Columbia and the Tigers dominated that game from start to finishing winning 68-56.

Georgia finished the season with a 7-11 SEC record that landed them a 12th seed in the SEC Tournament. Their best player is 6’8 senior forward Yante Maten. He is not one to be taken lightly as the reigning SEC Player of the Year award winner.

The key to beating Georgia is simply to not let the rest of the team beat you. Maten is going to get his, but hold him as much as possible and stop the rest of the team and Mizzou should be fine.

This should be a game MU wins easily from start to finish. The best case scenario is that they get off to a quick start and put the game away early. Then they can work Porter Jr into the lineup without worrying about the score.

They can run their sets  to get him in the flow and just use this as a warm up game. The team will need the warm up too, because with a win they’ll be going into a tough battle with Kentucky on Friday.

The game against Georgia is all about Porter Jr. Lets all hope he gets through the game healthy as goal number one. If he can look good and be a part of a win that is goal number two. The hardest part of the game tonight should be how are Tiger fans going to get out of work to see it. I predict a lot of doctor appointments for about 2:15pm!