Porter Jr. knows what MU-KU rivarly means

COLUMBIA, Mo. - Michael Porter Jr. remembers sitting at the top of section 209 in Mizzou Arena and watching the Tigers play after his family moved to Columbia in 2010.

He remembers the Kansas games particularly well.

Jordan Barnett, whose path to Columbia from St. Louis first went through Austin, Texas, remembers the 2012 game in Columbia in which Marcus Denmon hit three huge 3-pointers down the stretch and Tyshawn Taylor missed two key free throws to secure a 74-71 win for No. 4 Missouri against the eighth-ranked Jayhawks. He was at the game on a recruiting visit to see the Frank Haith-led Tigers, and said next Sunday's exhibition is his chance to experience playing in the rivalry.

Players on this team from Missouri - Ronnie Suggs, Jontay Porter, Kevin Puryear and Cullen VanLeer - are more than likely aware of what the Border War entails and what the atmosphere will be like in the Sprint Center. But the other 10 scholarship players on this team?

"I didn't know much about the rivalry," said Kassius Robertson, originally from Toronto, Canada. "I know a lot about KU, but I didn't know much about the rivalry.

"To be honest I'm still learning about it. I knew that it used to be called the, what, the Border Wars, something like that? Yeah. But for me it's just another game, just a chance for us to get better, get closer as a team, and also raise money for the hurricane relief, so that's going to be big."

Blake Harris and C.J. Roberts had similar answers. Those not in the know had to ask teammates who did.

On paper and in name, the Showdown for Relief is an exhibition game and its primary cause is to raise money for hurricane relief. And the players know and spoke about the importance of the cause. Roberts' grandmother lives in the Houston area, and he said he called her every night before he went to bed during the storms. She was in good shape during the aftermath, he said, and everyone involved realizes the positive impact this game can have on people that desperately need help.

But no fan in attendance is going to treat it like an exhibition game once the opening tip goes up, and the players and coaches certainly won't, either.

"I'm sure both teams are going to play and give it everything they have," said Puryear, who went to high school at Blue Springs South in the Kansas City area. "It's going to be a game. We're not going to go out there and go through the motions. It's going to be good competition on both ends. Both teams are going to play hard, and I know fans are going to be fans, so it's going to be exciting."

"I think we're going to try to win every game, so nothing different from Kansas to any other team," Blake Harris said. "We just have to be ready."

This game will be treated as ammunition by fans, no matter how it shakes out and no matter how much money is raised to support those in Texas and the greater Houston area, Florida, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. If Missouri wins, fans will harangue Bill Self and Kansas with renewed vigor in an attempt to renew the rivalry. If Kansas wins against what could turn out to be the best Tigers roster this decade and in contention for the best ever, the Jayhawks will point to the 172-96 all-time record in their favor and say the game isn't worth their time.

"It's a huge rivalry and it has been for a long time and it has been for a long time," Barnett said. "So just to kind of restart that a little bit will be fun. It'll be a great way of seeing where we're at. It'll be our first game, in a way, and we'll be out there prepared and it'll be a really good chance to see where we're at and what we need to get better at offensively, defensively, all that."

While at Texas, Barnett didn't play against the Jayhawks, meaning no one on Cuonzo Martin's first Missouri team has played against Kansas.

The game isn't exactly low-stakes, but it won't count officially toward anyone's record or the official rivalry tally. And as far as tune-ups go, the Tigers will be helped far more by a competitive game against an equal (or better) opponent than a tiny D-II or D-III school without the in-season pressures.

"When Coach (Martin) said it was a possibility, I told (my teammates) y'all better get ready, because this game (means) a lot to a lot of people," Porter Jr. said. "So we've got to go out there, play hard, and put on for Mizzou."

The real win for Missouri, regardless of result, is it will face conference-level play before non-conference games start and get a chance to really see which lineups are effective against quality opposition, on both ends of the floor. And that's something that will be more helpful to the Tigers' success this season than kinda-sorta renewing a rivalry that, as of now, doesn't look as if it will spill into the regular season anytime soon.

But still, it is Missouri-Kansas, playing against each other in men's basketball. And it won't feel, or be treated like, an exhibition.

"No, no I don't treat it as an exhibition game at all," Porter Jr. said with a small laugh. "Any time you see Mizzou and Kansas on the same floor, I think it could just be a little scrimmage with nobody there, we would play as hard as we can."