The Tigers accidentally tried a new strategy.
Coming out of a timeout, which Missouri women’s basketball coach Kellie Harper called after Alabama had scored 11 unanswered points toward the end of the first quarter to take an early nine-point lead, Mizzou returned to the court with a new formation. New, but illegal.
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There were six Missouri players on the court. In the end, Alabama shot free throws and received possession shortly after the officials were made aware and went to a video review, which resulted in a technical foul on MU. Mizzou had yanked one of its players and didn’t actually run a full possession with six. It cost Mizzou four points in the end.
Mind you … in the SEC this season, six players on the floor might be what it takes to stop some of these teams.
Missouri women’s hoops lost 74-63 to No. 21-ranked Alabama on Monday night at Mizzou Arena and is now 0-4 in SEC play. All four of its losses have been by double-digits. In what is almost certainly the toughest opening stretch of conference play anywhere in the nation, all four games also have come against teams currently ranked among the top 25 in the nation.
Mizzou has been competitive in portions of three of those four games. But, the Tigers haven’t managed to get across the line in the brutal opening stretch.
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And that’s really the last piece to place in Year 1 of the Kellie Harper tenure.
“I told the team, just two more stops, one more score in the middle of that game, and that’s a different ballgame,” Harper said. “That’s like three more plays, and I think we could have made three more plays.”
Those are the margins when the competition is this stiff.
In Texas coach Vic Schaeffer’s postgame press conference Sunday after a road loss to LSU, he waded into conspiracy territory, saying, seemingly only half-joking, that someone in the league office might not like the Longhorns after his team had to face league powerhouses LSU and South Carolina in back-to-back games.
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“They obviously have a vendetta against Texas. … It really has a stench to it,” he said. … “I’m really disappointed in the league.”
If they don’t like Texas in the Birmingham offices, they must loathe the Missouri Tigers.
Mizzou gets that same back-to-back stretch in February. Both on the road. Sunday, Feb. 22 in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Thursday, Feb. 26, in Columbia, South Carolina. But long before Missouri gets that gauntlet, it’s currently in the mire of another.
Missouri is 0-4 in SEC play. Here’s who Mizzou has lost to, with the teams’ current AP rankings:
No. 4 Texas. No. 5 Vanderbilt. No. 7 Kentucky. No. 21 Alabama.
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Those four teams, combined, are 68-3 this year.
The Tigers hung tight for the first half of their games against UT and UK. Mizzou, for what it’s worth — and Harper will get to that — has a habit of being competitive for long stretches but not 40 minutes. Both games turned into double-digit beatings. All four SEC games have been double-digit losses now.
It doesn’t necessarily feel that way. But that’s what the record shows.
“There’s got to be this balance of competitiveness,” Harper said. “We don’t want to be beat down because of the schedule we played, but we also don’t want to just say, ‘hey, this can happen.’ That’s (what) I was telling them — I don’t know if anybody else thought that we could have won the game. I feel like we could have won the game.”
Missouri head coach Kellie Harper directs her players during the first half of an NCAA college basketball game against Vanderbilt at Memorial Gymnasium Thursday, Jan. 8, 2026, in Nashville, Tenn.
Missouri is fighting.
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Against Alabama on Monday, the Tigers put together a 16-2, second-quarter run that cut a 17-point deficit to a two-score game and made the visitors in Crimson work in the second half. MU wing Grace Slaughter was tremendous with 23 points and nine rebounds. Mizzou center Jordana Reisma was a handful, and guard Abbey Schreacke knocked down four 3-pointers. The Tigers had a 6-0 spurt to close the third quarter that made it a four-point game. It was competitive.
But, for the fourth straight matchup, the opponent pulled away. Alabama grabbed control in the fourth quarter and rode it to a road win and, now, a 17-1 record.
“Just being in these games and being able to have close moments, whether we’re up or going into halftime with a three-point (difference), it’s just being able to recognize that we can play in these games,” Slaughter said. “And if we can put together a full four quarters, we can definitely get some wins.”
Missouri battled. Dug itself out of holes that probably should have been too deep to see out of.
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But, this year, the size of the fight in these Tigers probably isn’t gonna cut it.
Mizzou is running into real quality. Quality that is sustained for four full quarters. Quality that will compete deep into March and April.
It’s easier said than done to knock off one of these opponents. By the time the regular season is up, the Tigers will have faced five more teams currently ranked in the AP Top 25. That’s more than half of their league schedule.
More: ‘I wasn’t done.’ Inside Missouri coach Kellie Harper’s year away, happy return to sideline
More: Missouri football to hire former Clemson OC as offensive assistant | Report
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But there’s a chance, on paper, coming. Mizzou’s next two games — Thursday at home against Arkansas, and Sunday on the road at Florida — are against the only two other 0-4 teams in the league.
Missouri has shown fight. Enough resolve to hang tight in a weight class in which it probably doesn’t yet belong.
Now it needs to show it can sustain it.
“That’s what we try to talk about with our team. Man, you’ve got to believe you can win that game. You’ve got to be on the court thinking we can win that game,” Harper said. “And that’s how important those plays are. So, you know, there’s this balance of — yeah, I mean, it’s great. We know we can do it. Well, let’s finish a job. Let’s compete at an elite level.
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“That’s the mindset we’ve got to have. And I know it’s hard. I know it’s hard. These are good basketball teams, and I’m sure human nature is, ‘ugh.’ But we want to have a little bit more competitive fight that we can get the job done.”
This article originally appeared on Columbia Daily Tribune: Missouri women’s basketball shows fight in Alabama loss but needs next gear
