Indians hunt for wins in Alabama

Southeast Missouri State University's Indians hope this week's road trip to Alabama treats them a lot better than last week's trek to Tennessee.

The Indians, who lost by one point at Tennessee Tech last Thursday and by two points at Austin Peay on Saturday, are in desperate need of some Ohio Valley Conference wins.

This week the Indians (9-8, 2-4 OVC) will try their luck against the conference's two first-year members, beginning with tonight's 7:30 tipoff against Jacksonville State (9-9, 2-5). Southeast faces Samford (8-9, 3-3) Saturday afternoon in Birmingham.

"Every conference game is important, but we really need to have some success on this trip," Southeast coach Gary Garner said. "The two games last week were really disappointing, but we're so close to being a good basketball team.

"The big thing is to not get down and hopefully some of these games will start going our way."

Southeast's four OVC losses have been by a total of nine points, meaning the Indians could conceivably be in first place right now instead of eighth among the league's 11 squads.

"We're really close but we're just falling a couple of points short," junior guard Derek Winans said. "We just can't get down. We have to keep a positive attitude. Hopefully some of these games will start going our way and we'll get over the hump."

Added junior forward Dainmon Gonner, "It's real frustrating, losing all these close games. We have to learn to play the whole 40 minutes, keep our intensity up, not just play for 34 or 35 minutes."

Garner knows that if the Indians can start getting some of the close games to go their way, they can climb right back into the thick of the OVC race.

Although first-place Austin Peay and second-place Murray State appear to be the cream of the conference crop -- they have records of 8-0 and 5-1, respectively -- the Indians are just two games behind third-place Morehead State, which is 4-2. And Southeast is just one game out of fourth place.

"Naturally you want to win the conference championship, but the big goal is to get in that top four and have a home game for the first round of the conference tournament," Garner said. "Realistically, it's going to be really tough for us to win the championship, but getting in the top four is still wide open.

"I told our players that we're in eighth place now, but if we go and win both these games, we'll probably come back in about fourth or fifth place. That's how close things are."

Even though Jacksonville State and Samford aren't considered among the OVC's elite teams, they have made respectable impressions during their debut season in the conference.

"They're both good basketball teams and they're going to be tough to beat on the road," Garner said. "But I like our chances."

Jacksonville State was strong last year, going 20-10 overall and 10-6 in the Atlantic Sun Conference, but the Gamecocks graduated their three top scorers. They struggled at the beginning of this season but have played well lately, including a five-point loss at Murray State.

Five players are averaging in double figures for the Gameocks, led by 6-foot-6 senior forward Trent Eager (12.5 ppg).

Eager is followed by 6-0 senior guard Scott Watson (11.2 ppg), 6-0 sophomore guard Walker Russell (10.7 ppg), 6-3 senior guard James Denson (10.6 ppg) and 6-8 junior forward Carl Brown (10.5 ppg).

"They like to get it up and down the floor and they like to press," Garner said. "They have really good athletes who can put it on the floor and shoot."

Saturday's game at Samford figures to be a real challenge because the Bulldogs -- who also competed in the Atlantic Sun last year -- employ the seldom-seen Princeton offense that utilizes constant motion, screens and cuts and generally runs off most of the shot clock. Points should be at a premium.

The Bulldogs have already pulled off the shocker of the OVC season so far, winning at Murray State.

"That's going to be a very difficult game to prepare for," Garner said.