Edgar leads Redhawks against his former team

~ The first-year Southeast coach faces Murray State for the first time.

Scott Edgar undoubtedly will experience plenty of emotions tonight when he coaches a basketball game in Murray, Ky., for the first time since 1995.

But Edgar won't let that get in the way of trying to beat the school where he made his mark as a head coach.

Edgar's sole focus will be on leading his current team -- Southeast Missouri State -- past Murray State in the 7:30 p.m. tipoff at the Regional Special Event Center.

"I won't know until I get there," said Edgar, when asked what will be running through his mind when he takes the court. "But my No. 1 objective is to win the game, because I know how difficult Murray State has always been to beat at home, and still is."

Edgar actually never coached at the Regional Special Events Center, which replaced the old Racer Arena and was built after he left Murray State.

But Edgar acknowledges that some of his best basketball years were spent during his four seasons at Murray State, which he led to a 79-40 overall record, a 56-17 Ohio Valley Conference mark and two NCAA tournament appearances.

"It's very special and it always will be special," Edgar said. "I had special players there and special friends there.

"I will be more focused than any game I've ever coached in."

Edgar, however, hasn't been involved with the Racers' program for more than a decade.

And now Southeast's first-year coach is immersed in helping the Redhawks (5-11, 3-4) continue climbing up the OVC standings after they recently endured a six-game losing streak, which included four straight conference defeats -- three by a total of seven points. Two of those came on shots at the buzzer.

The Redhawks have rebounded with two consecutive wins, 88-74 at Eastern Kentucky on Tuesday night and 80-65 at home over Eastern Illinois on Thursday night.s

So all of a sudden, after starting last week tied for last place in the 11-team OVC, the Redhawks are in sixth place -- and thinking much bigger than that.

"I said when I came here that there will be a point in time where we won't be a fun team to play against. We're getting closer to that," Edgar said. "We were losing those heart-breakers at home, but I saw us keep getting better.

"It's getting polished, but it's nowhere near a finished product."

After rolling to last year's OVC regular-season and tournament championships, Murray State also has a new head coach in Billy Kennedy, succeeding Mick Cronin, who now is the coach at Cincinnati.

While the Racers (7-8, 5-2) got off to a slow start -- which included a loss to a Division II Seattle Pacific and just two wins in their first eight games -- they have been solid in OVC play, standing in fourth place but just percentage points out of second.

The Racers have been led offensively by Bruce Carter, a key player on last year's junior college national championship team at Arkansas-Fort Smith Community College.

Carter, a 6-foot-4 junior guard, is averaging 13.5 points per game. He also leads the squad in rebounding with 5.1 a contest.

Tyler Holloway, a 6-2 sophomore guard, is the Racers' other double-figure scorer with a 11.7 average.

Holloway is second in the OVC in 3-point shooting at 43.2 percent (35 of 81) and he is the league's top free-throw shooter at 91.4 percent (32 of 35).

Holloway had a career-high 29 points Thursday night as the Racers rallied from a 16-point halftime deficit to win at Tennessee State 86-83 in overtime.

Murray State returned just one starter from a year ago, 6-5 senior forward Shawn Witherspoon, the OVC's preseason player of the year.

Not a big scorer -- he averaged 10.6 points last season -- Witherspoon is averaging 9.3 points.

"Carter is a very good player, Holloway can really shoot it and Witherspoon is also a really good player," Edgar said. "They've got a very good team, and it's going to be another tough OVC game."

With an added dose of emotion likely to be thrown in.