Mizzou Hoops Player Review: Trent Pierce

I’m not sure how well people remember the vibes in late December, but they were decidedly awful. The Tigers were a mess. They started December (predictably) undefeated at 8-0, but went just 2-3 in December. Their wins were over 318th Alabama State and 240th ranked Bethune Cookman. And losses were to a pretty awful Notre Dame team, and two blowout losses to Kansas and Illinois.

The Tigers lacked on a lot of fronts. But with nearly two weeks in between the Illinois loss and the start of SEC play, the staff went back to the drawing board for the season. There were a couple wildcards though. Jayden Stone missed some time with an injury, but Trent Pierce had yet to see the floor as he dealt with a hip injury.

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But just 3 minutes and 27 seconds gone in the first half, Trent Pierce checked in for the first time. Without adding in any unnecessary hyperbole, Mizzou’s season fortuned changed. Pierce played 19 minutes, he scored 10 points and hit a couple threes. But Pierce’s versatility on both ends of the floor provided a stop gap, or maybe a better descriptor is paper mache, over the holes in the roster.

Before Pierce returned to the lineup, Mizzou’s NCAA chances were all but shot. They squandered their limited Quad 1 games, and were noncompetitive in rivalry games. But with Pierce in the lineup, the math made a lot more sense. On the season he managed just 42% of the minutes, but once he hit the lineup it was hard to keep him off the floor. Trent’s average of 28.4 minutes per game was the third highest after Mark Mitchell and Stone.

More than anything it was Pierce taking another step forward as a player. He upped his points per game average to 10.4, improved his rebounding, but perhaps more than anything he shot 38.4% from outside, and 75% from the free throw line. Pierce has always teased as a shooter, but the results varied far too frequently.

He was 0-1 in a loss to Texas and 0-4 in a loss to Alabama, but other than that Pierce made a three in every game. Take those…

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Publish date : 2026-09-05 10:00:00

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