Anderson era begins in weekend tourney

~ The Tigers will open its regular season with a trio that was a combined 38 games under .500 last year.

The schedule figures to be more grueling than the competition for Missouri at the start of the Mike Anderson era.

Quin Snyder's replacement unveils his run-and-gun style today against North Carolina A&T in the first of three games in three days in the John Thompson Foundation Classic in Columbia, Mo. The Tigers, opening the school's second century in the sport with the earliest starting date, follow with games against Army on Saturday and Stetson on Sunday in the round-robin event.

Missouri, 12-16 last season, dominated in a pair of exhibitions against Missouri-Rolla and Lithuania Academy. The Tigers are favorites in all three in their opening weekend, given that North Carolina A&T was 6-23, Army was 5-22 and Stetson finished 14-18, but will not approach overly confident.

One good reason: Although Missouri has won 32 of its last 33 home openers, the exception came last year against Houston. Snyder is also the only one of the school's 15 head coaches to lose his debut, in 1999 against Wisconsin.

"Now is what you call playing for keeps," point guard Jason Horton said. "Every game counts, every game could affect your end of the season.

"This weekend is going to be a challenge because we have three back-to-back games. It's going to test our conditioning and really test our depth as a team as well."

The weekend tournament will be the first at Missouri since the Walsworth Publishing Classic in 1988 and 1989.

Missouri forced 77 turnovers and piled up 49 steals in the two exhibition victories. Marshall Brown averaged 21 points and had five dunks.

"I think exhibitions are what they are," Anderson said. "I think more than anything else it gave us a chance to play somebody other than ourselves.

"But that's history. Now it changes to a different mind-set because the season is here."

Army plays Stetson in the tournament opener at 4:30 p.m. today, followed by Missouri and North Carolina A&T at 7 p.m. On Saturday, Stetson plays North Carolina A&T at 12:30 p.m. followed by Missouri vs. Army at 3 p.m.

On Sunday, North Carolina A&T plays Army at 1 p.m., followed by Missouri vs. Stetson at 4 p.m.

Anderson has not settled on a lineup. He'll get a chance to tinker with his roster minus injured guard Keon Lawrence and forward Glen Dandridge, each sidelined by a broken foot, while also assessing the conditioning level. A third player, Leo Lyons, is out indefinitely for violating the team's academic policy.

"I'm more worried about what we do than what other teams do, and you'll hear that from me a lot," Anderson said. "Right now we're trying to prepare our guys.

"Hopefully we have enough depth and enough guys that we'll be ready to play."

Horton, one of the holdovers from the Snyder era, said the team definitely is in shape to play Anderson's run-and-gun style.

"I don't think any other team is going to be as conditioned as us, especially playing the way we play," Horton said. "It's going to be interesting.

"I think we just have to work on getting better every game and every practice."