Indians find a more balanced UMKC waiting

Trying to slow down the nation's fourth-leading scorer from last season will not be Southeast Missouri State University's only concern when Missouri-Kansas City visits the Show Me Center for a 7:30 tipoff tonight.

The Kangaroos (2-2) have apparently given explosive senior guard Michael Watson quite a bit of help as they prepare to take on the Indians (3-2).

Watson is still averaging a healthy 17.8 points per game, although that is quite a bit below last year's 25.5 mark that ranked fourth among all NCAA Division I men's players.

But the Kangaroos have become a much more balanced offensive team as junior-college transfers Mike English (16 ppg) and Brandon Temple (12.5 ppg) are also scoring in double figures, with Temple shooting 50 percent from 3-point range (13 of 26).

"Watson is a great player and he has the ability to take over a game," Southeast coach Gary Garner said. "But English is evidently really playing well, so they've got two kids who are scoring, and Temple has also given them good play."

Still, Watson remains the Kangaroos' focal point. The four-year starter entered this season averaging better than 20 points per game during his college career. He's shooting just 29.5 percent from the field so far but Garner knows he's capable of far better than that.

"What scares you is that a guy like him can really get on a roll and then there's not much you can do about it because he's so talented," Garner said.

The Kangaroos' talent in general has Garner wary. Not only are their three top scorers dangerous -- English is averaging a team-leading 8.5 rebounds and has grabbed 11 offensive boards despite standing just 6-foot-4 -- UMKC has a powerful inside presence in 6-9, 300-pound center Carlton Aaron, a Temple transfer who averages 9.8 points and 6.8 rebounds.

"They're an athletic team. You look at their scores and they only lost by 11 at Minnesota, which tells you a lot," Garner said.

UMKC's most recent outing was Thursday's 104-80 rout of Texas-Pan American as five Kangaroos scored in double figures, led by Watson with 27 points and English with 18. English hit all seven of his field-goal attempts and is shooting a sizzling 60 percent for the season.

Southeast is also coming off a solid performance as the Indians lost 71-58 at Southern Illinois Wednesday night, although the game was much closer than that score. Southeast trailed by just six points in the final minutes before SIU stretched out the margin at the end.

"We played with a lot of heart, but we still have a long way to go and we have to keep improving," said junior forward Dainmon Gonner, the Indians' leading scorer at 15 points per game.

Junior guard Derek Winans, Southeast's other double-figure scorer at 10.8 points per game, said the Indians can draw quite a few positives from the SIU loss.

"It was tough to lose, but we did a lot of good things. We can learn from that game and try to move forward," Winans said. "We have a really good team this year and we need to bounce back with a win."

With a Tuesday game at Arkansas looming, the last thing the Indians want is to fall back to the .500 mark before hitting the road. But Garner doesn't expect the Kangaroos to be easy pickings.

"We need to win, but I look for a really tough game from them," he said. "I don't think there's any one real key to beating them;, I just think we have to be really solid in the way we play."