Missouri senior Tony Criswell is up to his old tricks, so he won't be traveling to the Southeastern Conference Tournament that begins this week in Atlanta, Ga.
"Tony will not be making the trip based on he's got some things he's got to take care of back here in Columbia," Missouri head coach Frank Haith said Monday, before the eighth-seeded Tigers take on ninth-seeded Texas A&M at noon Thursday in the opening round of the SEC Tournament.
Criswell has had trouble staying on the court this season, as this will be the third such instance of the year. The forward missed Missouri's first two games of the season against Southeastern Louisiana and Southern Illinois, as well as an SEC game Jan. 11 at Auburn, after being suspended for violations of team rules.
According to the Columbia Tribune, Criswell ran into some legal trouble last week. Criswell lost a judgment in civil court and was ordered to pay $2,717.57 in rent and late rent and $823 in attorney's fees in a case involving his apartment complex, The Reserve at Columbia, according to a court document dated March 6.
Criswell averages 3.9 points and 3.4 rebounds while playing 13.9 minutes per game as a reserve. Those numbers are down across the board compared to last year, as the forward averaged 5.8 points and 4.2 rebounds in 14.2 minutes behind Laurence Bowers and Alex Oriakhi.
Criswell has seen his playing time dwindle the past several weeks. Ten minutes marks the most he's played in the the previous six games. That's compared to earlier in the season, when it wasn't out of the norm for Criswell to play 20-plus minutes.
Although Criswell won't be playing this week, Haith didn't rule out the senior from participating in postseason games.
"He's got stuff he's got to take care of," Haith said. "So we'll just see how that goes."