Indians' offense hits snooze during second-round setback

Southeast Missourian

NEW ORLEANS -- It didn't take long to tumble back down to earth.

One day after posting a surprisingly lopsided win over heavily favored Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Southeast Missouri State University lost to Indiana State 68-55 in Friday's second round of the University Hoops Classic at Tulane's Fogelman Arena.

The Indians (2-2) have today off before finishing the six-team tournament Sunday. Although their opponent has not been determined, it's likely they'll be in the third-place game at 3 p.m.

"It's disappointing to lose after the way we played against Wisconsin-Milwaukee," Southeast coach Gary Garner said. "But Indiana State is a good team. They're not a great team, but they're good."

Southeast sizzled from 3-point range in Thursday's 14-point win over Wisconsin-Milwaukee, hitting 13 of 23 from beyond the arc. But the Indians were just three of 18 from long range Friday and shot just 41.9 percent (23 of 57) from the field overall.

While Garner said Southeast having to play on consecutive days while Indiana State was in its tournament opener hampered the Indians, he gave credit to the Sycamores' sticky defense.

"They obviously had more energy than us, but they're a good defensive team, a very good defensive team. You earn everything you get off of them," Garner said. "And I thought we took several bad shots, which hurt."

Struggling the most for the Indians was sophomore guard Derek Winans, Southeast's leading scorer who entered the game averaging 19.3 points after scoring 25 against Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Winans was just one for nine from the field Friday and missed all seven of his 3-point attempts on his way to just two points.

"Nothing went right for us. We took some bad shots and we couldn't hit the good shots we got," Winans said. "I had some good looks, but the shots just wouldn't fall. I have nobody to blame but myself."

Southeast's second-leading scorer, junior forward Damarcus Hence at 17 points, hit just two of seven shots from the field and scored only four points.

The Indians were led by senior forward Tim Scheer, who scored 18 points in his second straight strong performance off the bench. Scheer, who missed most of the season's first two games with a strained calf muscle, hit six of 11 from the floor.

"They played tough defense on us and we didn't execute like we should have," Scheer said. "We knew they would be a tough team. They just executed a little better than we did."

Junior center Brandon Griffin scored 17 points on 8-for-12 shooting and grabbed a game-high 11 rebounds. But no other Southeast player scored more than eight points and nobody else had more than five rebounds.

Indiana State (2-1) was led by 6-foot-5 freshman David Moss, who came off the bench and scored 26 points when he hit 10 of 11 from the field.

The Indians started strong as Hence scored the game's first four points. Southeast still led 12-7 when Indiana State began to surge. The Sycamores used a 9-0 run to go up 16-12. Later an 8-0 Indiana State spurt put the Indians in a 26-17 hole.

Southeast battled back and Griffin's 15-footer in the late stages of the opening half put the Indians up 29-28. But the Sycamores scored the final seven points of the half to lead 35-29 at the intermission.

Indiana State opened up a 45-31 advantage early in the second half and that was pretty much the game. Southeast could only get as close as nine points at 47-38 and the Sycamores led by as many as 15 points in the late going.

"We knew they'd be good and well coached, but we could have beaten them if we had played better," Scheer said. "Now we just need to bounce back Sunday. It would be great to go 2-1 in the tournament against some really good teams."

mmishow@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 132