National Signing Day: Mizzou basketball readies to sign Top 5 class
Missouri men’s basketball is one step closer to the future.
The Tigers shocked the recruiting world this summer, emerging quickly as the favorite for Rivals Industry five-star guard Jason Crowe Jr. Head coach Dennis Gates and his staff pulled it off in July at Nike EYBL Peach Jam to land the Class of 2026 shooting guard.
Missouri continued to bolster its class from there, landing four-star power forward Toni Bryant and three-star small forward Aidan Chronister during their respective official visits in September. When National Signing Day begins for NCAA Division I basketball Wednesday, running through Nov. 19, the Tigers will sign all three coveted recruits without any issues.
The Tigers boasted the No. 2 recruiting class for 2026 on Wednesday, trailing only Arkansas for the top spot. Kansas currently stands as the third-ranked program in the 2026 Industry Team Recruiting Rankings.
Jason Crowe Jr., SG, Lynwood (Calif.) Inglewood
The first commit for Missouri in the 2026 class, Crowe used his official visit with the Tigers the weekend of Sept. 12, roughly a week after Gates came to visit him in California during the NCAA Recruiting Period. Alongside Chronister, Crowe returned to campus for the home opener this past Friday against Southeast Missouri State.
“I didn’t know he would get to this point,” Jason Crowe Sr. said leading into his son’s commitment. “You can’t project this. I don’t think that’s possible.”
The younger Crowe, a 6-foot-3, 170-pound senior at Inglewood (Cali.) High, appeared a Kentucky favorite before Missouri’s push this past summer. USC and Texas also emerged as contenders before Crowe publicly announced his decision July 18, his 17th birthday.
Status: Unsigned
Crowe will hold his signing ceremony at 1:30 p.m. Thursday at Inglewood. As the Tigers have “known for a long time,” they’ll receive Crowe’s signature then, a source confirmed.
Scouting Report
Rivals senior national recruiting analyst Jamie Shaw: “Jason Crowe is a natural scorer. He plays with a lot of confidence, and he has good balance and footwork to get clean looks in the half court. He is a shooter, he has soft touch and deep range on his shot and he likes to get to the jumper and will use an array of step backs or side steps to get it off. Crowe is a volume shooter. He does not put much pressure on the rim, setting more for shots away from the basket. He can also get shot happy, disrupting the flow of offense at times. Defensively, Crowe can have lapses and inconsistent effort. The shooting is the superlative and he gets shots up at a high volume.”
Toni Bryant, PF, Tampa (Fla.) Zephyrhills Christian Academy
Bryant, who also officially visited North Carolina, made a quick commitment to Missouri on Sept. 8, the day after his official visit ended. The 6-foot-10, 215-pound forward always admired Gates, even nearly a year before his first visit to campus, the same weekend as the football team’s Border War win over Kansas.
“I haven’t really had too many conversations with head coaches that are like that,” Bryant said in December 2024. “They run an NBA offense. He was telling me like they played fast, and I excel when my teammates push the ball. He was just telling me that he thinks that it would be a great fit.”
Gates visited with Bryant a few months prior in September 2024, his second in-person trip to see the four-star. The two talked for 30 minutes about the college level. Gates reiterated a lot of the same principles as Bryant’s former coach, Zach Reynolds, at Tampa (Fla.) Zephyrhills Christian Academy.
“Someone that’s going to just love me hard,” Bryant said about the similarities between Gates and Reynolds. “The whole time, he was talking about relationships, relationships, relationships. That’s the most important thing, and that’s the most important thing to my coach here, building relationships. You never know who you’re going to meet. He’s telling me the same exact things that my coach always tells me, so I kept note of that.”
Status: Signed
Missouri announced Bryant’s official signature first Wednesday.
“Toni is a gifted talent who can be a dominant forward at Mizzou,” Gates said in a release. “We have had success with players that share his skillsets like Kobe Brown and Mark Mitchell, and we think he can be the next forward to flourish within our system. Offensively, Toni plays above the rim, can run the floor and shoots the ball well for his size. On the defensive end, he is a top shot blocker and can rebound the ball with the best of them. He is already a force to deal with but we think his best basketball is still in front of him.”
Missouri and Bryant developed a relationship the past few years with the help of Reynolds. When Bryant was in eighth grade, Reynolds reached out to now associate head coach Kyle Smithpeters, visualizing how Bryant might fit with the program.
“When he stepped foot on campus earlier this year, it just sealed the deal and it felt like home for him,” Reynolds said in a release. “We knew that he would be around great people, and there is a great community for him at Missouri.
“Toni is a blue-collar kid. He is going to work extremely hard and is very approachable. He is still new to basketball as he hasn’t been playing his entire life.”
Scouting Report
Shaw: “When Toni Bryant is at his best, he is running from the front of the rim to the front of the rim. At a lengthy 6-foot-10, he is a twitchy athlete, and he can guard multiple spots when he is locked in. He has shown a tendency to float in and out of games, consistently going long stretches with minimal production. He has tried to show an ability on the perimeter, where he does have some touch, but he hasn’t been able to create consistent advantages there yet. Bryant has excellent physical tools, and there is some upside there if he is able to consolidate his game, learn his comfortable spots on the floor and go from there. When the motor is running hot, he can be a versatile defensive presence.”
Aidan Chronister, SF, Fayetteville (Ark.) The New School
Chronister always looked like a Missouri lean. Even after announcing his commitment following his September official visit during the Mayor’s Cup, the wing emphasized how the Tigers had been recruiting him for over two years.
“I chose Mizzou because of the family atmosphere I’ve grown to be a part of over the last 809 days, along with them being one of the best programs in the country,” Chronister told national basketball reporter Joe Tipton.
“He came out of the room, and he was like, ‘I know. I just know,'” added his father, Graham Chronister. “I think we all knew as well. But it was just for him to be able to realize it and feel like he had made that decision. There’s no need to look at anything different. … We’re just proud of him for taking that step and making that decision on his own behalf.”
The younger Chronister, who moved back to his home state this past year from Wichita (Kans.) Sunrise Christian Academy, will either have digitally signed Tuesday night or Wednesday morning. Fayetteville (Ark.) The New School will host a signing ceremony at 1:15 p.m. Friday in its athletic center.
Status: Signed
Missouri announced Chronister’s official signature second Wednesday.
“We’re thrilled to welcome Aidan to our Mizzou family as he was a priority for us early in our tenure here,” Gates said in a release. “He is a seamless fit in our system as he has great size and length and plays the game the right way. He spreads the court with his elite shooting ability, cuts and moves really well and is a great decision maker and passer. We look forward to Aidan joining our program and helping us contend for titles at Mizzou.”
“Aidan is a high-IQ basketball player with a foundation constructed around playing the game the ‘right’ way,” added The New School Head Coach DeShaun Stark. “If there is an open man, he’s passing the ball, even when he could easily get his own shot. This IQ is built on a learner’s mentality as he continues to be a sponge soaking up any knowledge he can. A player who desires to be coached and pushed towards greatness — with a work ethic that is necessary to be great.”
Scouting Report
Shaw: “Aidan Chronister has a great frame, projectable with legit size. He has fluid athleticism. In theory, shooting is his thing. At his size, the hope is that he can pull gravity beyond the arc. He is going to have to work through the balance points of his shooting platform to become a more consistent shooter at this point. Added strength will be necessary, especially in his base, continuing to develop his game outside of catch and shoot, maybe with one and two dribble pull up. At his best, he is moving around in the half court, hunting his areas on the floor to pull gravity as a shooter. Next step is turning that theoretical shooting into consistent production. At his ceiling, he brings an incredibly valuable and scalable tool.”
When can you watch Missouri’s 2026 signees?
Before joining the official roster ahead of the 2026-2027 season, this trio will compete in the Norm Stewart Classic at Mizzou Arena in December. Crowe and Inglewood first joined the tournament before Bryant and Chronister’s respective schools followed.
Crowe will take the floor against St. Louis (Mo.) Principia at 8:30 p.m. Saturday, Dec. 6. Bryant and Chronister will matchup right before at 7 p.m. The three will also have individual sessions with the TrueSon Basketball Camp that weekend alongside former Tigers power forward Laurence Bowers.