Ishee, women's basketball program ready to move on

With the NCAA review complete, the report released and the penalties announced, Southeast Missouri State women's basketball coach John Ishee is ready to move on to more pressing matters.

"My focus is on becoming a better offensive coach," Ishee said Wednesday following the news conference to announce the release of the NCAA report. "We scored 40 points against Eastern Illinois back in March [in a loss at the Ohio Valley Conference tournament].

"We've got a great group of kids to work with and we've got a good program and all my energy is focused on that."

Ishee took over the program in 2006-07, first as the interim coach. After guiding the team to an OVC championship and NCAA tournament berth, he was named the league's coach of the year and received a three-year deal from the university.

The violations and penalties announced this week had to do with the previous coach, B.J. Smith, who built the program from 2002-03 into an OVC champion in 2005-06. That title essentially was taken away by a vacation of records over a two-year span.

"It's time to move forward, and I don't really have any comment other than that," Ishee said.

While he said the cloud that has hung over the program since February 2006 was not on his mind — "I don't bring it up and it's not something I focus on," he said — other Southeast officials thought the resolution after a 29-month ordeal would brighten the program's future.

"We have an excellent women's basketball program," Southeast president Dr. Ken Dobbins said. "Coach Ishee is doing a great job. Our student-athletes are excellent. This has been tough on them. It does take its toll on the student-athletes and coach Ishee and his staff. Hopefully, we can get on with the process of concentrating on women's basketball instead of having that cloud hanging over our heads."

Added Southeast athletic director Don Kaverman: "It's been hanging over our program for far too long. It's not fair to the women's basketball program, it's not fair to those student-athletes and the coaching staff, it's not fair to the athletics program and it's not fair to the university to have that kind of thing hanging over us. We want to demonstrate that we've responded to the issues that were raised as a result of this investigation in a positive way, and we want to move forward."