MU: Foul disparity ‘hard to swallow’

By Tom Keegan     Jan 20, 2008

? A whopping 52 personal fouls were whistled Saturday night during Kansas University’s 76-70 victory against Missouri in Mizzou Arena.

Missouri coach Mike Anderson had a problem with the way some of them were called, and he wasn’t able to bite his tongue during the news conference after the game.

“I’ve never seen so many block/charges called in a long time,” Anderson said. “The thing about it is, none of them went our way. And for a coach, that’s kind of hard to swallow.”

Asked later if all the whistles made it disruptive for the teams trying to get into a smooth offensive flow, Anderson smiled.

“That’s a good statement,” he said. “I like that statement. You made it. I didn’t. There was a lot of disruption.”

Anderson spent most of his time at the podium discussing not the whistles, rather his team’s poor shooting.

Missouri made just five of 28 three-point shots for a .179 accuracy rate and made just half of its 22 free throws (Kansas made 28 of 45 free throws).

“We had a lot of open looks,” Anderson said. “Matt (Lawrence) had some open looks. Marshall (Brown) had some open looks. Keon (Lawrence) had some open looks. You’ve got to knock ’em down against a team like Kansas. We shot it up 71 times, so we had the opportunities.”

Brown, asked about the disparity in fouls, indicated it had as much to do with the ultra-aggressive style of defense Missouri plays for Anderson, a former understudy to Nolan Richardson at Arkansas.

“Coach gets on us any time we don’t have a lot of fouls because that means we’re not getting after it,” Brown said. “I think we got after it and made all their shots tough, but there comes a time when you can’t foul so much. … I think we did all the things right to win the game.

“The free-throw line was the biggest difference. They shot 40-plus free throws, and we shot only 22. That means we’re not getting to the basket. We’re not drawing contact. I think it was a little bit of their defense, packing it in. That makes you rely on your outside shooting, and when you’re not making them, that’s tough.”

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