DeAndre Gholston scored 22 points and Kobe Brown added 19 as Missouri routed Houston Christian 105-69 Saturday in Columbia, Mo.
Noah Carter scored 14 points and D’Moi Hodge added 13 for the Tigers (7-0), who played all 15 players on their roster and got points from 12 of them. They led for all but 30 seconds of the game.
Maks Klanjscek led the Huskies (1-6) with 17 points. Andrew King scored 13 and Tristan Moore added 11.
The Tigers hit 11 of 25 shots from 3-point range and earned 28 assists on their 43 made baskets. They scored 26 points off the fast break and 62 points in the paint.
Missouri got 14 offensive rebounds and scored 13 second-chance points.
The Huskies opened in a 2-3 zone defense hoping to slow the Tigers down. But Missouri raced to a 16-0 lead with Hodge hitting two 3-point jumpers and Brown and Gholston hitting one each.
That forced Houston Christian to switch to a man-to-man defense, which didn’t work either.
The Tigers forced five early turnovers to feed their transition game and pushed their margin to 25-3 less than 7 minutes into the game.
Houston Christian responded with a 17-9 surge fueled by two 3-point jumpers by Moore to cut Missouri’s lead to 34-20.
But Missouri continued playing with tempo with four- and five-guard lineups. Gholston knocked down consecutive 3-point jumpers as the Tigers pulled away to a 54-30 halftime lead.
The Tigers used all 12 of their scholarship players in the first half. They forced 12 turnovers and scored 15 points off them.
Brown scored twice in the lane to fuel Missouri’s 8-0 run early in the second half. That pushed the Tigers’ lead to 64-34 and ended whatever suspense that remained in the game.
–Field Level Media