Reloaded Mizzou basketball backcourt set to add four-star playmaker Anthony

COLUMBIA, Mo. — Anthony Robinson is naturally biased, but he believes the first high school point guard to join Missouri’s program under coach Dennis Gates will be uniquely prepared for the challenges of college basketball.

That point guard is his son, four-star prospect Anthony Robinson Jr., the first player to commit to Gates’ 2023 recruiting class last summer. As athletics director at Florida State University Schools, Robinson oversees his son’s program that’s coached by a legend in the Florida Panhandle: former Florida State two-sport standout, Heisman Trophy winner and NBA point guard Charlie Ward.

Under Ward’s watch, the high school basketball team, which includes Robinson’s sophomore son Amare, runs more like a modern college program. 

“I tell them all the time they will not understand until later on in life the advantages that they have with Coach Ward as their head coach,” Robinson Sr. said. “What he does at our high school he gives kids the closest experience to college basketball as you can in high school. He treats it all the same, from workouts, to film, to rehab to whatever he is doing. It’s always from a professional to a college to high school-type routine, which is very special, along with his thinking, his planning. He’s very organized. Everything is detailed. And he just lets the kids go out and play. He puts the system in place.”

“And (another) good thing is he ran a lot of similar actions that Missouri ran as well. So it’ll be bit easier and a smooth transition for ‘Ant.’ ”

“Ant” as in Anthony Jr., the 6-foot-3-and-still-growing playmaker who pledged his commitment to Mizzou’s program last June, months before the Tigers embarked on a 25-win season in Gates’ first year on the sideline. The Robinsons were well acquainted with Gates and his staff long before they arrived in Columbia. Mizzou associate head coach Charlton “C.Y.” Young began recruiting Robinson when he was in middle school, back when Young and Gates were assistants at Florida State under longtime Seminoles head coach Leonard Hamilton. Florida State University School, Robinson’s high school, is considered a laboratory school that’s sponsored by the nearby university in Tallahassee and collaborates with FSU’s College of Education.

The Robinsons were sold on Gates and Young without needing to see if the Tigers would thrive under their watch. For years they had a front-row seat to their success in Tallahassee.

“One thing from my perspective is that everywhere Coach Gates and Coach Young have gone all of their former players love them,” Robinson said. “And that’s rare. You always find those two or…