COLUMBIA, MO. • Missouri’s strategy made sense against Arizona’s depleted lineup.
The Tigers went into Saturday’s showdown against the country’s No. 20 team with a plan to throw every junk defense coach Kim Anderson could find in his tool shed, even a few he never used in his first two seasons at Mizzou.
The goal was simple: Make Arizona’s 7-footers uncomfortable and tempt the guards to shoot from the perimeter. The Tigers came into the weekend with Division I’s best 3-point field-goal percentage defense. Arizona didn’t have two of its best guards. Force the Wildcats to play lefthanded, as the coaches like to say.