MSN's 18 things about the tourney

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16. If you’re looking for a second weekend crasher, consider Missouri. The Tigers were an NCAA tournament team without Michael Porter Jr., and now they’ve potentially got one of the best players in the country—if he’s healthy. (More on that below.) Plus the No. 1 seed they would draw second round, Xavier, is a relatively vulnerable 59th in defensive efficiency. But first Mizzou will have to beat Florida State without senior forward Jordan Barnett, who was suspended for the Tigers’ first-round game after being arrested on suspicion of DWI over the weekend.

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ICYMI

The most-dissected 23 minutes anyone played off the bench this past week were those of Missouri freshman Michael Porter Jr., the celebrated forward prospect and likely top-five NBA draft pick who had not seen game action since playing two minutes in the Tigers’ season opener in November. He left that game with what turned out to be herniated discs in his back, for which he underwent surgery. With a three-to-four-month recovery timetable and the potential of damaging his NBA career before it begins, most presumed Porter would never see the floor as a collegian again.

But after weeks of will-he-won’t-he speculation following his being cleared for practice, Porter returned for the surprisingly NCAA tourney-bound Tigers in the SEC quarterfinals against Georgia. The results were mixed: he was able to play substantially off the bench, and the Mizzou staff showed his was more than a token appearance, as he was featured to the extent of using a team-high 36% of the team’s possessions. Yet he didn’t quite look himself, shooting 5-for-17 from the field in a surprising loss; Tigers coach Cuonzo Martin even conceded to reporters that Porter, while having the same mindset as before his injury, was “maybe a step slow.”

This much is understandable. It was, after all, his first game back after a nearly four-month layoff following major surgery. As much as Mizzou fans would have loved to see Porter fulfill all those preseason dreams immediately upon returning, working one’s way back in such circumstances is a process. A deeper SEC tournament run would have had the added benefit of allowing Porter to shake off that much more rust, but at least now the speculation is over, and perhaps any jitters gone with them, before the stakes get higher this week. “I’m glad he actually got it out of the way,” Martin said after the game, “and we can move forward.”

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