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SportsMarch 1, 2001

It was a very painful loss on Tuesday night when we fell 72-70 in overtime at Austin Peay in the opening round of the Ohio Valley Conference Tournament. We outplayed a very talented Austin Peay team for 39 minutes, but two turnovers and the missed front end of a one-and-one free-throw opportunity in the final minute allowed Austin Peay to send the game to overtime and they got some big shots from Nick Stapleton, including a fall-away jumper with just 3.2 seconds remaining, to gain the win...

Gary Garner

It was a very painful loss on Tuesday night when we fell 72-70 in overtime at Austin Peay in the opening round of the Ohio Valley Conference Tournament.

We outplayed a very talented Austin Peay team for 39 minutes, but two turnovers and the missed front end of a one-and-one free-throw opportunity in the final minute allowed Austin Peay to send the game to overtime and they got some big shots from Nick Stapleton, including a fall-away jumper with just 3.2 seconds remaining, to gain the win.

I was proud of our team's effort and the fact they became a good basketball team over the final month of the season. I really feel that, had we gotten to Nashville, we were playing good enough to win the tournament and advance to the NCAA Tournament.

I know that is easy to say now that we are out, but I really feel at this point in the season we are as good as any team in the OVC.

We controlled Austin Peay for 39 minutes because we played with great intensity, we had our offense together and we had great patience on offense. The game got away because we had turnovers and because they got too many offensive rebounds throughout the contest that kept them within striking distance.

I told the team at halftime, when we led by 12, that Austin Peay would make a run in the second half, but that we had to continue to be patient and we had to take care of the basketball.

Our defense has been solid all season, but I thought our execution of the defensive game plan was excellent against Austin Peay. We made some changes in how we guarded their NBA prospect, Trenton Hassell, and the players executed the plan.

The season has ended and the pain is there, but I am very proud of how this team developed over the last month of the season. We struggled offensively early in the year, but we finally got it together on offense and the stats bear that out.

In the last six games, including a five-game winning streak to end the regular season, we shot over 50 percent from the field. We shot better because we got the ball inside and that created better shots both inside and outside.

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Our young inside players like Drew DeMond, Tim Scheer and Daniel Weaver all developed confidence and really helped us down the stretch.

We had a great group of seniors that I discussed in detail last week, but we also have a good group returning for next season. In addition to the players you saw on the floor, we have three players in practice every day that will be key members of next year's team.

Bobby Smith is a 6-2 guard who transferred from Villanova, Derek Winans is a 6-2 redshirt freshman and Justin Smith is a 6-3 guard who transferred from Arkansas State at the semester.

We signed guard Brett Hale of Dexter during the early signing period and he had a tremendous senior season.

We are all hitting the recruiting trail now that the season has ended. We need some strong inside players to go along with the perimeter players we already have on campus.

Our staff and players are disappointed that we did not get back to Nashville this season. We had a disappointing regular season, but we had hoped our late improvement would get us back to Nashville and the opportunity for another trip to the NCAA Tournament.

It didn't happen, but in the disappointment I know that I had a great group of young men who came to practice wanting to get better every day.

And, as I mentioned last week, our fans are the greatest.

Gary Garner is the head basketball coach at Southeast Missouri State University

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