Bold, Those Tigers

"Everybody had stale faces," Peeler said of Missouri's attitude at intermission. "Then Coach came in and reminded us who we were playing. 'Forget they're Number One,' he said. 'Forget the rankings. This is Kansas. The Big Eight. Just go out and play like they're anybody.' "

Which is exactly what the Tigers did in the first five minutes of the second half, when they concentrated on getting the ball inside. Smith made two buckets, Buntin two more. (The tandem would combine for 21 baskets and 45 points that afternoon.) Coward struck from three-point range, then drove for a three-point play. Missouri scored eight of the first 11 baskets of the half for a 61-53 lead with 14:56 left, and Smith was poised for a turnaround from the baseline that would have made the lead a nice, round 10 points. But he missed, and gritty Kansas came on again.

Stewart believes this is his best passing team at Missouri, and in fact, the Tigers' ball movement was beating the Jayhawks' perimeter defenders badly. "It's hard to play pivot defense when you aren't getting much help outside," Williams said. Still, if Missouri is the Guarnerius violin of passing teams, Kansas is the Stradivarius.

Calloway (16 points) caught fire from afar—"I thought he was only an offensive rebounder," Peeler said, "but he was hitting everything"—and when Jayhawk Mark Randall (18 points and eight rebounds) converted another back-cut layup, Kansas had sliced the Missouri lead to a basket (77-75) with 5:25 remaining.

Then, a weird call. As Calloway was tightening up defensively on Missouri's John McIntyre, the Kansas forward slipped and fell. McIntyre attempted to drive to the basket but tripped over the prone Calloway's leg, and an intentional foul was called on Calloway, giving Missouri two free throws plus possession of the ball. At 5:11 left, McIntyre missed one and made one from the foul line; the crusher for Kansas was that Missouri retained possession. "I don't want to say it was the play of the game," Williams said. "But in a game like this, a play like that is magnified."

Five seconds later, Jeff Gueldner of Kansas fouled Peeler, and it didn't take a magnifying glass to reveal what that meant—only a bit of history.

Four days earlier, Peeler had had two free throws at Oklahoma State with nine seconds remaining and the score knotted at 71-71. He missed the first one. "It looked like the Carrier Dome with all that orange waving around," he said. The Carrier Dome? Did this kid's geography class take a field trip to Syracuse, or what? Then Coward strolled over to his teammate at the line and suggested that Peeler get the ball off his palm and onto his fingertips. Peeler made the second free throw for a 72-71 victory.

Last Saturday, Peeler stayed fingertips-perfect. He made both free throws, for an 80-75 lead, and thereafter Kansas never got closer than three points—and never three points with possession. Smith and Peeler scored 16 of Missouri's final 17 points, and the Tigers finished with four starters—Peeler, Coward, Buntin and Smith—contributing 20 points or more.

"This was just a single game," Stewart said afterward, addressing the subject of the No. 1 ranking. "I didn't listen to all the hype. Number One is for the fans; the players and coaches don't pay much attention to it."

O.K., but wasn't this a nice way to celebrate a birthday?