How Sean East bet on himself and became a key piece of Mizzou's NCAA Tournament bid

One of Sean East II’s signatures is his teardrop floater.

Throughout Missouri basketball’s 2022-23 season, it’s proven deadly for defenses. East can get it off under duress, slicing through opponents until he gets held up, then sending the ball high into the air and through the basket.

The move didn’t originate from organized basketball. According to the Louisville, Ky. native, he honed the shot by playing pop-a-shot games as a child.

“Dave and Busters or Mr. Gatti’s, I used to always get the high score,” East said. “Doing that, led to (having the floater) on the court and ever since, I’ve had it.”

His father, Sean East I, said one of his first basketball memories of his son was on a family trip to Universal Studios in Orlando. The younger East had been spending time in the family basement playing on a toy hoop and came across a game room with a pop-a-shot in Orlando.

“He ran off maybe like 35, 40 shots in a row,” his father said. “It was kind of crazy.”

East II has taken a roundabout path through college basketball to get to MU.

Now that he’s in Columbia, the guard plays a key role for the Tigers, with his ability to push the ball up the court and execute perfect laser beam passes in big situations.

East knows how to win basketball games. With the postseason in focus, he is poised to play a major part in Missouri’s continued success.

“He’s infectious, man,” MU head coach Dennis Gates said of East. “A hard worker. No one puts in more time than he does on this team and this program. He knows the janitors, the janitors know him. He knows how to turn the lights on and then turn them off in the entire arena.”

‘Such a joy to be around'

Tiffany East knew her son had basketball talent early on. When Sean was 18 months old, his older brother Carlos, then aged nine, got a “real” basketball goal for Christmas.

Sean got a Fisher-Price toy hoop that went up to six feet high. Then he shocked his parents.

“At first we had it low and he was shooting on it,” Tiffany said. “Then we put it all the way up to six feet and he could still shoot on it. We were like ‘What is going on?’

“It was crazy.”

The Easts seemingly know how to foster athletic talent. Sean’s older brother Carlos played football at Southwestern Oklahoma State, and his younger sister Tiarra is currently a budding star basketball player at Temple.

When Sean II was four, his parents signed him up for the neighborhood youth basketball league. The future Tiger missed his first game due to a coaching oversight, when nobody informed Sean I and Tiffany that it was scheduled.

The next week, he made his organized hoops debut.

“He put up 35 points,” Sean I said. “They had the placemats where you had to play defense, and he was smart enough to just put one foot on the mat and he was stealing the ball all the time. He was just dribbling it all the way down in scoring.”

When the league changed the rules to slow him down, Sean I realized his son might be a legitimate talent. Through his eighth-grade year at Ramsey Middle School in Louisville, Sean II also played football, as a quarterback.

After a few concussions, he decided his future lay on the hardwood and started focusing on basketball. When it came time for high school, he joined his longtime AAU teammate and current San Antonio Spur Romeo Langford at New Albany, just across the Ohio River from Louisville, in Indiana.

The Bulldogs were packed with talent during his time there, with Langford, plus current Arizona Cardinal Rondale Moore and several other future college players. Even among so many great players, East was the one making the machine work.

“It was amazing,” New Albany head coach Jim Shannon said. “Sean would be our playmaker. He could score any time he wanted, but he was more of a playmaker point guard. He really didn’t care who got the credit, he was just trying to win.”

East did plenty of winning during his high school years. He counted 100 victories while at New Albany, scored over 1,000 points, had 335 assists, and now has his Indiana all-star jersey hanging on the wall in the Bulldogs’ gym.

New Albany played in sold-out gyms throughout his time there. In 2016, they won the 4A Indiana State title, and East played a major role, grabbing a key steal and making the three-pointer that put the Bulldogs ahead for good.

“He just did it all,” Shannon said. “He was just such a joy to be around. He’s got a lot of enthusiasm. He has a love for the game, love for his teammates. Makes everyone around him better.”

After his high school career ended, East didn’t have the offers he was looking for. He wanted to play Division I basketball and decided to try and get there by prepping for a year at Combine Academy in North Carolina.

It worked. He grew as a player, developed his body, and achieved his goal.

East headed to Massachusetts for his freshman year.

'Just enjoy the game'

East had 20 starts during his freshman year at UMass. He led the team with 4.9 assists per game, and 39 total steals.

But for the young guard, his season ended like most everyone else’s in college basketball in March of 2020. The Minutemen were sent home when the Atlantic 10’s tournament was canceled due to the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Then, he got a taste of the harsher side of college basketball.

“He got told to transfer from UMass,” Sean I said. “That really crushed him.”

East picked himself up and headed to Bradley. He played well with the Braves, starting 20 games, finishing third in the Missouri Valley in assists per game, and second in assist-to-turnover ratio.

Behind the scenes, however, it wasn't going well for East personally. Because of COVID precautions, he spent nearly all his time in his room, isolated from his friends.

He also couldn’t travel home. For East, who his mother described as a “homebody,” this was difficult. Beyond that, he didn’t feel he was fitting in basketball-wise with Bradley’s system.

One morning Sean was home in Louisville after his season at BU. He was going to transfer again.

He had offers from other Division I schools at the time, but those required him to sit out for a year. He decided on the junior college route.

“I was betting on myself,” East said. “I knew it was going to be a good look, we were going to win games… I knew I was gonna get something out of that, just had to go there and do the right things and work hard.”

His chosen destination was John A. Logan Community College in Illinois. The Volunteers were coached by current MU assistant, Kyle Smithpeters, who heavily recruited Kentucky and had noted East’s talent years before actually coaching the guard.

Smithpeters knew East wanted to develop his talents. But he also saw another reason the junior found his way to Logan.

Smithpeters wanted East to find his love for the game of basketball again.

“I think he kind of had a rough run going from UMass to Bradley," Smithpeters said. "Obviously, the production was good, but (he) wanted to find that ability to just enjoy the game again.”

According to his parents, East figures out what he wants and then makes a plan for how to get there. The junior college route was no different.

He was a star at Logan. He won the 2022 NJCAA player of the year award, averaging 20.9 points, 4.3 rebounds and 5.7 assists per game.

“They put some joy back in Sean,” his father said. “When the season started at Logan, they had a picture of him in the gym and he was smiling. He had the smile again.”

‘He found his niche'

East once again had options after his season at John A. Logan. He was leaning toward finishing his college career at BYU, and had even taken a campus visit.

Gates worked hard to get him to Columbia instead, calling East as soon as he stepped off the podium after his introductory press conference as Missouri’s head coach.

“From that point, I was like ‘OK, we’re serious,” East said. “I started taking him serious.”

After he signed, East was joined at MU by Smithpeters, who accepted a position as one of Gates’ assistant coaches. The coach took a hands-off role with East, to avoid the perception of favoritism.

From the start, East has been comfortable as as Tiger. According to him and Smithpeters, he has learned to be a more vocal leader, and he’s impressed teammates with his relentless work ethic at practice.

“He’s gonna beat you to the gym and stay longer than you, no matter how early you get here,” Missouri captain Tre Gomillion said. “He’s a team guy. He’s approachable, friendly, funny, he does it all. He likes to get his teammates involved, but he is the JuCo player of the year. He can score at will.”

East has acted as a perfect contrast to fellow point guard Nick Honor this season. He can push the ball upcourt aggressively, occasionally with a pinpoint full-court pass left over from his football days, makes a difference on defense and provides a scoring threat.

Gates has encouraged him to take risks on the court, which allows East the freedom to impact games. In Missouri’s win over Arkansas in January, he had 12 points, all in second-half crunch time, to lead the Tigers to victory.

“Sometimes he tries to appease and just go play perfect,” Gates said after the game. “You can’t play perfect basketball. There's nothing perfect about the game. You gotta go give your very best, live in your instincts and then go deal with the mistakes that you make or the successes that you have. I thought he found his niche.”

When games get chaotic, East is at his best. In Missouri’s win at Tennessee, a fast-paced, dramatic affair that ended in a Tiger buzzer-beater from near half-court, he had 17 points.

East never panicked throughout the game, even when MU seemed to be on the ropes, and was prepared to take the hail mary shot if DeAndre Gholston didn’t.

“When the game has sped up, his process and his thinking just go into a natural ability to just make plays,” Smithpeters said.

East has another year of eligibility if he wants it. But first comes the postseason. Missouri has the double bye as the No. 4 seed in the SEC tournament and has an NCAA Tournament-worthy resume. Having a playmaker like East around can be invaluable this time of year.

The guard is prepared.

“That’s kind of how I’ve always been, just take what the game gives to me,” East said. “If it shows itself to make me be able to make a play, I’ll try to make it.”

East hasn’t lost the earliest sign of his talent either. Recently, in Smithpeters’ basement, he and fellow Tiger Isiaih Mosley came across a pop-a-shot game.

The Missouri teammates started to compete. It ended in a dead tie.

“We got up to 150 on each other,” East said with a laugh. “Anytime.”

This article originally appeared on Columbia Daily Tribune: How Sean East bet on himself, becoming a key to Mizzou's NCAA Tournament bid