Mizzou guard Mark Smith out for the rest of season, will have surgery

For the second time this season, Missouri has lost one of its best basketball players for the remainder of the year.

Sophomore guard Mark Smith will undergo ankle surgery on Monday and miss the rest of the season, the team announced.

The Tigers already lost star player Jontay Porter to a torn ACL and MCL shortly before the season opener.

Smith sprained his left ankle in Missouri’s loss at Arkansas on Jan. 23 and missed the following six games before returning in MU’s loss at Mississippi, despite not being fully recovered. He played in the Tigers’ loss to Kentucky on Feb. 19 when coach Cuonzo Martin said Smith had 2 inches of tape around his ankle.

After missing Saturday’s game at Florida, Martin said there was a chance Smith would be shut down for the season. Specifics of the surgery and recovery time were not made available.

A source close to the family said Smith will actually have his foot operated on, rather than his ankle. Smith originally injured the ligaments in his foot during his sophomore year of high school and the surgery is more of a precaution in case he further damages the ligaments by rolling his ankle.

A transfer from Illinois, Smith was the Tigers’ second-leading scorer, averaging 11.4 points per game and one of the team’s best rebounders with 5.2 per game. But his biggest asset to MU was his three-point shooting, which was one of the nation’s best at 45 percent. Smith’s season will go down as the eighth-best in three-point shooting in program history.

Missouri is 2-7 without Smith and has struggled to shoot over 35 percent from three in games without him.

The injury leaves MU down to just 10 available scholarship players for the rest of the season, barring any more injuries. Missouri plays at Mississippi State on Tuesday. Tipoff is slated for 6 p.m. and the game will be broadcast on the SEC Network.

This story was originally published February 26, 2019 at 10:56 AM.