My freshman year of college (2022-23) was made a little better by Mizzou basketball.

For the first time in several seasons, Mizzou Arena was consistently shaking with positive energy. The Tigers gave those in Columbia, from MU students to alumni, many reasons to venture down Mick Deaver Memorial Drive. Most of the time, watching them was like watching 15 guys constantly running through mushrooms on MarioKart. They played fast, drowned opponents from beyond the arc and, most importantly, won plenty of games.

And then, Mizzou basketball died. All of the goodness from the previous season evaporated, as a litany of issues — injuries, poor three-point shooting, an inability to get rebounds, etc. — rained down upon the Tigers, leading to their worst season by record in over a century. Mizzou was, as a wise man once said, straight up not having a good time.

Now, as January 2025 is in its home stretch, the fun has returned. Mizzou isn’t just 15-3 and 4-1 in conference play — both of which it hasn’t reached since the 2011-12 season — the Tigers have played like a Top 25 team for most of the season. After a monster win at No. 5 Florida on Tuesday, a sold-out Mizzou Arena cheered for most of the night, as the Tigers ran all over their border rivals en route to an 83-65 win.

“We had an unbelievable crowd,” Tamar Bates said.

The main propellor of success? There isn’t one. Rather, it’s a conglomerate of multiple aspects that have been vastly improved upon since last season. Mizzou is better at almost everything — scoring, defense, rebounding, etc. But the on-court fun that’s returned to Mizzou basketball has been a product of accomplishments made off the court.

“We’re starting to fall in love with the preparation for games,” Bates said.

Coaches often associate a season’s success with elite behind-the-scenes work — Gates did exactly that after Saturday’s game.

“This is a group that has not complained ever on anything, any situation, whether it’s been 5 a.m. wake-up for conditioning, double-days for practices, whether we’ve done all-defense practices or all-offense,” Gates said. “These guys have not blinked one time.”

One player who’s turned preparation into fun is Grill, who has lost consciousness from beyond the arc numerous times this season. He made three of four attempts from long range in the first half and four of six overall.

“He practices harder than anybody I’ve ever seen. He’s in the gym every day.” Bates said. “So it’s not a surprise when he checks in the game and makes the shots he does.”

Now, his touches in the halfcourt inject suspense into buildings and fear into opponents. The mere potential for him to fire away has caused numerous teams to completely freak out defensively, which creates wide-open opportunities for his teammates. That’s exactly what happened in the first half, when Trevon Brazile and Zvonimir Ivisic got sucked into a humanized black hole; the vacated paint was filled by a streaking Pierce, who got an easy dunk off of a sweet pass from Grill.

The elite play at both ends of the floor has also created high-flying opportunities. Columbia briefly turned into Dunk City on Saturday, as Mitchell, Pierce and Grill each threw down electrifying jams, the last of which was a dagger double-clutch slam from Grill that was a cherry on top of a dominant 17-point victory.

Also included in the dunkfest was Crews, who’d done most of his offensive damage from well outside of the paint. But over the past two games, he’s voyaged into the trees and climbed the ladder numerous times. That included a two-handed slam late in the first half, which eradicated the negative feelings stemming from a missed transition triple that bogged Crews down after the fact, Gates said.

“He was so mad that he missed that shot that it distracted him a little bit, and he put up his wall like most kids do when they’re hurt or bothered by something in frustration,” Gates said. “But the growth that he’s made is (that) he put that wall down, got back in, made plays, made winning plays.”

The Tigers have been potent offensively — MU has a plethora of solid-to-elite three-level scorers that are flanked by a pair of deadeye three-point shooters in Grill and Crews. But their defense created a ton of fun on Saturday night, too. Arkansas was flustered for most of the night; the Razorbacks shot just 5/23 (21.3%) from three-point range, while Adou Thiero and DJ Wagner, two of UA’s primary ball-handlers, registered four turnovers apiece. Mizzou also clogged passing lanes frequently, coming up with 10 steals that led to 16 fastbreak points.

“We didn’t spend much time in rotation. Our guys were in stances,” Gates said. “They were prepared, they were talking, they were pointing. They were doing all the things that we demand and have been demanding from day one.”

Another one of those demands from the get-go has seemed to be emotional consistency. While celebrations and extroverted actions have been aplenty for Mizzou, remaining level-headed has been referenced by Gates and players as a helper to victory.

An example of that on Saturday included both Bates and Grill reaching 1,000 career points in the first half. While the high of reaching that threshold may have been strong, it didn’t seem to affect Bates.

“It’s definitely an excellent personal achievement, but that wasn’t on my mind coming into the game,” Bates said. “I just wanted to get the W.”

Instead, Bates, Grill and the rest of the team kept chugging along and got that W. Even as LSU, Vanderbilt and Arkansas currently reside in the bottom half of the SEC standings, Mizzou has outperformed many projections so far.

Like scoring 1,000 career points, the joy of shooting up national rankings is strong. Mizzou leapt to No. 27 in KenPom and will likely enter the next edition of the AP Top 25. The Tigers might even crack the top 20, as Nos. 13 (Oregon), 14 (UConn), 16 (Gonzaga), 17 (Purdue), 20-23 (Michigan, Ole Miss, Utah State, Georgia) and 25 (Baylor) all lost this week.

But even with the program skyrocketing to heights rarely explored in recent Mizzou history, the team doesn’t seem to let such externality affect how they take on the future.

“We’re just not going to do too much talking,” Bates said. “We’re not really talked about, and we don’t really care.”

It’s a mentality that dates back well before the season, Gates said, during a team-building session with Dr. Joe Carr, the team’s psychologist.

“Dr. Carr talked about us being ranked at the end of December or January, and the guys immediately said, ‘We don’t need to be ranked, Coach,’” Gates said. “They don’t want to be ranked. They don’t care. They do not care about any of that.”

What’s been cared about, on the other hand, has led Mizzou to the top of the SEC gauntlet. There’s still a long way to go, but starting 4-1 in conference play has further legitimized the Tigers after they performed well throughout their non-conference slate.

But even as projections have been exceeded, even as the Mizzou Arena crowd has become contagious with elation, satisfaction appears non-existent within the locker room — at least in the long term. Whether the fun continues or not, Mizzou still believes its ceiling is high above it, one it’ll try to hit as their end-of-season goal remains the same.

“I don’t think we’re playing well,” Gates said. “I’m just being honest with you. I’m dead serious, and you guys may laugh at it, but I’m telling you, we have about two or three more steps to go.”

“Our goal at the end of the day,” Gates continued, “is to be in San Antonio, Texas.”