Most of the country’s college coaches and talent evaluators misread Melvin Booker his senior year at Moss Point, Miss., High School.
“Out of high school he was not highly recruited. But he’s passed up just about every guard in college basketball now,” Kansas coach Roy Williams said Sunday, after Booker scored a career-high 32 points to lead MU to an 81-74 win over the Jayhawks at Allen Fieldhouse.
Booker, who scored 24 points in the second half, tallied 15 in the last 8:21. His three with 2:10 left snapped a 69-69 tie and gave MU the lead for good.
“It seems like every time we play Missouri, they have somebody who goes crazy against us. This time we weren’t able to beat them like a couple times in the past,” Williams said.
Last year, Mark Atkins scored 30 points in KU’s 86-69 win in Allen. In 1992, Anthony Peeler popped in 43, but the Jayhawks prevailed, 97-89. In both those seasons, KU went on to win the Big Eight regular-season title.
On Sunday, Booker’s effort eliminated the Jayhawks (21-5, 6-4) from the conference race and assured MU (20-2, 11-0) at least a tie for the crown.
“There are only certain things you can do when a guy is on like that. You put up a hand, but he still hits ’em,” said forward Richard Scott, who had six points and five rebounds while playing 13 minutes.
The three that put MU in front to stay came against KU’s 1-3-1 zone.
“We were trying to throw him out of rhythm. He’d already made two three-pointers and a two-point shot,” Williams said. “It was a bad call on my part. We’d played it two or three times. We didn’t get the pressure up to the spot we were supposed to. If we had, he would not have been able to get as close as he did. That’s my fault.”
For the game, KU did hit 9 of 19 threes to MU’s 7 of 17, but the Jayhawks hit only 9 of 22 free throws to Mizzou’s 24 of 30.
Jacque Vaughn hit 4 of 6 threes, 3 of 4 free throws and scored a career-high 21 points. Greg Ostertag, who had 11 points and nine boards, hit just 1 of 5 free throws, and Steve Woodberry (14 points) 2 of 4 from the line.
“The tempo of the game, the importance of the game…Sometimes you’re out at the three-point line, you don’t feel there are 16,000 people watching,” Williams said. “You have more time to think on the free throw line.”
Booker, who scored 10 straight for MU and helped wipe out a nine-point second-half deficit, hit 3 of 7 threes and 13 of 14 free throws.
“They shot a lot, we missed a lot, especially me. I was 1 for 27,000,” Ostertag lamented. “It’s a tough loss, but it’s not the end of the season.”
KU will travel to Nebraska on Wednesday for a 7:05 p.m. tip. MU can wrap up the league crown with a loss tonight by Oklahoma State at Colorado or with a win at home against Oklahoma on Saturday.
