To answer the question in the headline: cover up inefficiencies!
Before I dive into that, but along those lines, let’s look at the advanced box score:
What’s the first thing that jumps out to you?
I’ll give you a second.
For me? Look at the number of plays run. Missouri had one more possession in which they were actively attempting to move the ball but finished with 59 plays, compared to Memphis’ 75 plays on 11 active possessions.
Missouri was 0-7 on 3rd-down and it didn’t matter (the officially NCAA blessed stat sheet will say 0-8 but that was the last play where Brady Cook took a knee).