We are counting down the days to the start of the college basketball season.
If you’re reading this on the day is was published, we have 47 days to the official start of College Basketball, and 36 days until we can see the team in action against K-State (presuming it’s televised).
The Full Non-Conference Schedule:
- October 23rd — at Kansas State (exhibition)
- October 29th — at UNLV (exhibition)
- November 3rd — vs Cleveland State
- November 6th — vs Saint Louis (in St. Louis)
- November 9th — vs SIU-Edwardsville
- November 15th — vs Marquette (in Chicago)
- November 18th — vs Alcorn State
- November 20th — vs Le Moyne
- November 24th — vs Evansville
- November 27th — vs Arkansas Pine Bluff
- December 1st — vs Pittsburgh (ACC-SEC Challenge)
- December 6th — vs Kansas (in Kansas City)
- December 12th — vs Nebraska (in Kansas City)
- December 18th — at Indiana
- December 20th — vs Illinois (in St. Louis)
- December 22nd — vs Chicago State
After the last few years of a poor lineup of Q4 games in the non-conference schedule, Missouri pulled a 180 and have schedule as well as anyone in the country. On top of playing Illinois and Kansas as previously scheduled, the Tigers are playing neutral court matchups against SLU, Marquette, Nebraska, and a road game at Indiana. There’s no question Dennis Gates stepped it up.
Let’s Meet: the Nebraska Cornhuskers
Hey, our old enemies! Missouri fans are well acquainted with Nebraska thanks to many decades of being tortured by them via football. I’ve never held Cornhusker hoops at the same level of hate as Nebraska football, but that mostly stems from the fact that they were never elite in basketball, and Mizzou was often punching up at the Nubs on the gridiron.
Founded in the late 1860s, the campus in Lincoln, Nebraska didn’t welcome students until they were able to set up some buildings for their first classes in 1871. Sports didn’t come around until 1890 when they decided to pick up football, which is largely considered a questionable decision for all parties involved. In 1891, Nebraska and Missouri, along with Iowa and Kansas, formed the Western Interstate University Football Association. I know it’s catchy, right? Nebraska called themselves the Bugeaters, which fits.
By 1897 the school decided to jump into the peach basket craze and formed a basketball team. The Bugeaters (really that’s what they were calling themselves in the early years) handed an early Kansas team led by Dr. James Naismith the school’s worst loss in it’s history when they won 48-8. I don’t know I just found that fact funny. Mostly because Nebraska’s basketball success really kind of ended there.
Missouri and Nebraska stuck together in league affiliation, from the WIUFA (still catchy) to the Missouri Valley, then Big 6, and Big 7, then Big 8 and Big 12. They left for the Big 10 in 2011 having never won an NCAA Tournament game in just six tries. Which is just wild to me. From 1986 through 1998 the ‘Huskers made those six tournaments, with four in a row connected with the appearance of Eric Piatkowski being on campus. If you can tell me who succeeded the head coach at the time (Danny Nee) you’re a better person than I am. Only because I looked it up, but Barry Collier and Doc Sadler both failed to get them back to the NCAAs.
The hire of Tim Miles from Colorado State looked promising when he made the tournament in his second season. But Miles simply made the Nubs ‘not embarrassing’ and failed to fully elevate the program. Enter a familiar name.
Head Coach | Fred Hoiberg | 8th Season 112-115
Fred Hoiberg in his playing days, wearing Reebok pumps… man those were the days. Shoes that had a pump on them that filled air packets that made your shoes more snug.
Hoiberg is an Iowa State grad, and was really good as a player. Enough that he had a 10 year NBA career. After retiring, Hoiberg moved into the Minnesota Timberwolves front office for a while, before taking the Iowa State job in 2010. He had no coaching experience prior, but was colloquially known in Ames as The Mayor, due to his being from Ames, playing at Ames High School, and then leading Iowa State as a player for four years. And his tenure at Iowa State was really good. He was there for five seasons and went to the NCAA Tournament in each of the last four years, with top 10 finishes in the AP Poll the last two years.
Following that success, Hoiberg made the move to coach in the NBA. But his mistake was taking the Bulls job. He was fired in 2018 after an abysmal start, and opted to get back into the college game the following March. He took the job at Nebraska, which many might question the decision but Hoiberg was actually born in Lincoln, Nebraska so why not take a tough job that’s close to home?
It didn’t start out all that well. Nebraska won 14 games each of his first two seasons. And in year 3 they only won 10 games. After four years it was hard to see thing getting much better. The Nubs managed to go 9-11 in Big 10 play, but were still just barely inside the top 100 in KenPom. But it’s a good thing they stuck with him, because Hoiberg made the NCAA Tournament for the first time in 10 years the next season. And after a competitive 2025 year, Nebraska had their best season in a long time, and possibly ever, last year. They finished 16th in KenPom, 28-7 overall, 15-5 in the Big 10, and won their first 20 games on the season. It was truly an awesome season, they didn’t lose to anyone outside of the top 30, and their first loss was by 3 to the eventual national champions. Oh, and he won not one, but TWO NCAA Tournament games. The first in school history.
Hoiberg may or may not be able to keep this going, but there’s no doubt he’s done things at Nebraska no one else ever has.
Series History | Kansas leads 177-95
The last time Missouri and Nebraska played a basketball game was in 2011, it was in Lincoln and Mizzou lost by 11. But the Tigers had won four of the previous five matchups, and overall have a 126-93 record against the Nubs.
The largest margin of victory was in 1989 when the Tigers ran Nebraska off the floor in Kansas City during the Big 8 tournament. The largest road win was a 1980 21 point win. In all the Tigers have defeated Nebraska by 20 points ore more 13 times since the 1950 season. They’ve only lost by 20 points or more twice, once in 1966 and then again in 1997. In a season with one really big highlight (a 2OT win over top ranked Kansas), then a lot of other bad including their worst ever loss to Nebraska!
There’s a lot of history between these two teams. Of Missouri’s all time opponents, Nebraska still ranked 4th in all time meetings with 219. Missouri has played KU, Iowa State, and Kansas State more. And in time, Oklahoma will catch up now that the two are likely locked into a two game series each year.
What about the team now?
After their best season in program history, Nebraska returned five of its top 10 in the rotation from last year.
The big name returning is Pryce Sandfort who comes back for his senior season after scoring 18.1 points per game following his transfer from Iowa.
Gone, however, are the players who occupied the 2nd through the 5th spot in minutes played a year ago. Reink Mast was a tailor made big man for Hoibergs system, and made everything go on the offensive end of the floor. Also gone is Sam Hoiberg and Jamarques Lawrence who both graduated, plus Berke Buyuktuncel who transferred to Vanderbilt.
To replace the production, Hoiberg used the transfer portal, adding point guard Trevan Leonhardt from Utah Valley, and Sam Orme, a skilled big forward from Belmont. As a sophomore, Orme averaged 12.7 points and Leonhardt chipped in 11.9. Boden Kapke also moves into Mast’s spot after scoring 10.6 points and 5.7 rebounds for Boston College a year ago.
Nebraska’s early BartTorvik.com rankings have the Nubs 15th overall, one spot ahead of Tennessee and one back from Texas Tech. That seems a bit high, getting Sandfort back in a boon, he’s a skilled player and an elite shooter. But the rest of the portal class is solid if unspectacular. I expect Nebraska to still be very good, but more top 30 good instead of top 15 good. Either way it should be a very competitive game in Kansas City.