The ‘menace’ who helped Memphis basketball get a statement win at Missouri

COLUMBIA, Mo. — Jahvon Quinerly and Jordan Brown stood shoulder-to-shoulder in the hallway outside the media room Friday at Mizzou Arena.

They had just led Memphis basketball to a remarkable come-from-behind 70-55 win over Missouri. Quinerly listened as a reporter asked him what that kind of thing does to a team’s confidence level. At the same time, Brown was quietly perusing the final box score when his eyes widened, as though the sixth-year senior saw something he couldn’t quite comprehend.

“My fault,” Brown began. “I was just looking at (Missouri’s) field-goal percentages from the first half to the second half.”

No apology necessary. He was right to be stunned. Not by his running mate’s (Quinerly) 18 points, eight rebounds, five assists and three steals. Not by the 12-0 advantage Memphis had in the second-chance points category. And not by the first double-double of David Jones’ Tigers career (10 points, 10 rebounds).

Instead, defense was the jaw-dropper for Brown. Missouri shot a crisp 43.3% in the first half, only for Brown and his teammates to limit the SEC team to a pitiful 19.2% in the second.

And it was that turnaround that was just about all anyone from Memphis could talk about after Friday’s game. During the same postgame interview, Brown was asked by a reporter whether panic ever set in for the Tigers when they found themselves trailing by 14 points with fewer than six minutes left in the first half. That’s when Quinerly interjected.

“Wait, can I talk about that?” he asked, drawing a few chuckles from some nearby. “Nah, because I’m happy about that.”

Quinerly, the transfer point guard who spent the past three seasons playing for Alabama, was happy about the resolve the Tigers showed. They could have buckled after falling so far behind in front of a sold-out crowd of 15,000-plus on a game airing on the SEC Network, he said. But they didn’t.

Why?

“I think that’s the veteran leadership that we have and some of the veteran guys we have,” he said. “It’s so important to have these guys in situations like this. We came back in the second half, had a helluva half defensively. That’s what kind of got us going.”

Rick Stansbury, serving as Memphis’ acting head coach while Penny Hardaway is suspended for the first three regular-season games, said the strategy was simple: Stop Missouri guard Sean East II. The 6-foot-3 guard was giving Memphis fits in the first half.

Memphis had a clear size advantage over Missouri, but the quicker East was having his way with the visitors’ big men, dropping 14 points during a stretch that spanned 10:45 on the clock.

So at halftime, Stansbury made a subtle but critical alteration.

“You know, we didn’t start Nicholas (Jourdain) the second half,” he said. “We put (Caleb) Mills out there, another quick guy out there on East. Being big with Nicholas, we weren’t winning that war defensively.

“In the second half, they scored 22 points. Here at home. We scored 44 the second half, but it all started on that defensive end. Getting those stops. Mills was a huge change in that game.”

Huge, indeed. So huge that not only didn’t East, being guarded by Mills, score in the second half — he never even attempted a field goal. East was also 0-for-2 at the free-throw line after halftime.

MEMPHIS BASKETBALL: Tigers ace test at Missouri. Here are 5 takeaways from the win

“A defensive menace,” Quinerly called Mills.

“You know, Caleb Mills comes in and takes on that challenge and holds (East) to zero points, so I want to shoutout Caleb Mills — one of our other leaders,” he said.

Reach sports writer Jason Munz at jason.munz@commercialappeal.com or follow him @munzly on X, the social media app formerly known as Twitter.