Hot-handed Belmont men's basketball team defeats Southeast 107-94

Southeast Missouri State men's basketball coach Dickey Nutt spent several minutes outlining the problems that plagued his team against Belmont on Thursday night at the Show Me Center.

"We were outscored tonight," Nutt finally said, simplifying many problems into one big one. "We couldn't stop anybody. We just couldn't stop anybody. That's the bottom line."

The Bruins crossed into triple figures on the scoreboard with more than three minutes remaining in the game and defeated the Redhawks 107-94 in front of 2,168 fans.

"If you look at this stat sheet, and I know that this doesn't mean anything after a loss," said Nutt, sliding his reading glasses on and looking at the final numbers. "But if you look at the stat sheet and I tell you that we're going to outrebound them 31-23, we're going to shoot 57 percent, almost 58 percent from the field, we're going to shoot free throws 80 percent tonight -- shoot 16 out of 20 and really get to the line -- you would probably think that we're going to win, but that's not the case."

That wasn't the case because Belmont countered with 63 percent shooting from the field and 65 percent shooting from behind the 3-point line. The Bruins made 17 of 26 3-point attempts.

"They can shoot the ball pretty good," Southeast junior Josh Langford said. "It's hard to beat a team that executes their plays to the 'T' and they can shoot the ball that well. It's hard to beat a team like that, but we can beat them and we're going to see them again."

Langford, a transfer who became eligible in December, made his second consecutive start and helped the Redhawks keep pace early by scoring their first 11 points. He finished a perfect 10 of 10 from field and had 22 points.

"He just wants energy, so I try to give him energy, get defense right," Langford said of Nutt. "I know I've got to do better on defense. As a team we've got to do better, but we're going to be all right. We got to keep working."

Southeast's only leads of the game came when it was up 2-0 and 4-3 early on, but the Redhawks stayed within striking distance for most of the contest. They trailed 55-50 at halftime and closed the gap to two points after junior Jarekious Bradley made a 3-pointer to open the half.

Belmont replied with a 3 on its next possession, but Southeast appeared to gain some momentum when Langford's crowd-awakening dunk brought the Redhawks back within three points with 18 minutes, 5 seconds to go. But Langford was called for a technical for hanging on the rim, and the Bruins made both subsequent free throws to gain separation again.

Southeast climbed within a single possession one more time when it trailed 77-74 with 10:23 to play, but Belmont's Caleb Chowbay replied with a 3 and Bruins' lead was double digits less than two minutes later. The Redhawks never were closer than eight points after that.

There was little outside of defensive performance and improvement mentioned after the loss, which dropped Southeast to 8-8 overall and 0-3 in the OVC. Belmont, the defending OVC East and OVC Tournament champion, improved to 11-6 on the season and 3-0 in the OVC.

"There's a lot of space between them," Bradley said. "It was just hard to stop tonight. We were just getting mixed up on defense a lot. They were making us pay every time."

Five players finished in double digits for Belmont, led by senior JJ Mann, who finished with 25 points after scoring just two in the opening half. Sophomore Craig Bradshaw had 24 points and senior Blake Jenkins had 19.

"There's no denying right now we're certainly slacking on defense, and they certainly exposed us tonight with their dribble-drive," Nutt said. "Defensively, they made believers out of us in the first five possessions the way they shot the ball, and I felt like we needed to stay with our men and you really had no help in a lot of instances and it exposed us.

"We've got to keep working. I know the responsibility falls on me. We have not been a good defensive team. It's something we stress every day. We spend all of our time on the defensive side of the ball and still go out and not as good as we want to be."

Nutt said that despite the continued focus on defensive improvement, he's yet to see results.

"I don't really like what I see in practice," he said. "We're trying to stay solid in practice, trying to get better. I think the effort really is good. We make some good plays, but we don't sustain it.

"We're not natural defenders. We have a mentality of scoring the basketball. We have some scorers in our minds. It's just not coming natural to us. It's something we've got to keep working on, we've got to keep harping on and we've got to play the defensive guys and try to hide our best offensive that are maybe not as good defensively."

The Redhawks have just one day off before continuing conference play against Tennessee State at home at 5:30 p.m. Saturday.

The Tigers are just 2-15 overall this season and 1-2 in the OVC, but Nutt said he doesn't expect focus to be a problem for his team.

"I do think that -- and I'll step out on a limb here -- I do think our team understands that our back's against the wall," Nutt said. "We're getting off to an 0-3 start in our conference certainly puts everything in red alert, so you better start taking care of your home business. I think we'll come out and play as hard as we can."

Langford and Bradley both seem resolved after the game to continue to improve.

"We've just got to learn how to play together," Langford said. "It's a team full of new guys, so we've got to get the chemistry right. I know it's kind of late in the season, but I still think we have to get that team chemistry right. I think we're almost there, but we've just got to keep pushing a little more. Once it's clicks, it's going to be kind of scary."