Redhawks' OVC road will get tougher

Southeast Missouri State's best start to a men's basketball season in more than a decade will be tested severely over the next two weeks.

"We're getting to the more gritty games. We've got a cycle of tough games coming up," sophomore forward Tyler Stone said. "We're looking forward to it."

Southeast faces a daunting four-game stretch beginning Saturday at Tennessee Tech, which is coming off a 20-win campaign and was picked second in this year's Ohio Valley Conference preseason poll. The tipoff in Cookeville, Tenn., is set for 7:30 p.m.

The Redhawks host OVC preseason favorite Austin Peay on Jan. 26, visit Eastern Illinois on Jan. 30 and travel to undefeated, 10th-ranked Murray State on Feb. 2.

"These next four games will be a real bear," Southeast coach Dickey Nutt said. "I call them our big boy games. We're going to find out where we're at in a hurry."

Southeast, 10-8 overall and 5-1 in OVC play, is off to the program's best conference start since the 1999-2000 NCAA tournament squad began league play 9-1.

Southeast, which has won six of its last seven games, is second in the 11-team OVC. The Redhawks already have matched last year's overall win total and are just one victory away from equaling last season's OVC win count.

"Our conference schedule was set up for us to have a chance of getting off to a good start," said Nutt, whose squad was selected sixth in the OVC preseason poll and has played just one team picked ahead of it. "We were supposed to win most of the games we won, but that doesn't guarantee anything. You still have to go out and do it."

Tennessee Tech (11-8, 3-3) fell into a fifth-place tie in the OVC following Thursday's 63-62 home loss to 10th-place Jacksonville State.

"They'll be ready for us. It's going to be a big test," Nutt said. "They've got a very experienced team and one of the most talented teams in the conference."

The Eagles, second in the OVC in scoring at better than 73 points per game, feature two of the league's top three scorers in 6-foot-7 senior wing Kevin Murphy and 6-5 junior guard Jud Dillard.

Murphy leads the conference at more than 19 points per game. Dillard is third at more than 18 points and also is the league's No. 1 rebounder with nearly nine per contest.

The Eagles feature another of the OVC's better players in senior point guard Zac Swansey, who leads the league in assists by a wide margin at nearly six per game.

"They've got three of the top players in our conference and other good players around them," Nutt said. "We'll have our hands full."