Redhawks start losing streak

Southeast suffered its second straight loss, an 88-66 rout at Morehead State.

MOREHEAD, Ky. -- The streak Southeast Missouri State's Redhawks are currently on is not nearly as enjoyable as what they recently experienced.

Southeast began a two-game road trip riding the wave of seven consecutive victories -- the program's longest winning streak on the Division I level.

But Saturday night's stunningly decisive 88-66 Ohio Valley Conference setback at Morehead State gives the Redhawks two straight losses, after they fell at Eastern Kentucky Thursday night.

Southeast (13-12, 8-6) is in third place in the OVC standings, one game behind four schools with 9-5 conference records and two games behind OVC-leading Tennessee Tech at 10-4. The Redhawks, still in the running for a first-round OVC tournament home game, play their final two regular-season contests at home -- Thursday against Murray State and Saturday against Tennessee-Martin.

"It was a rough trip for us, but we just have to bounce back at home," senior forward Reggie Golson said. "If we can win the last two, we still have a chance to get a home game in the tournament, but it's going to be a lot harder now."

The top four finishers in the 11-team OVC play at home in the opening round of the eight-team conference tournament.

"We've still got a shot at it, but there's no question tonight's loss really hurts us," Southeast coach Gary Garner said.

Most disturbing to Garner was that the Redhawks had another miserable defensive performance.

After allowing Eastern Kentucky to shoot well over 50 percent from the field Thursday, the Eagles (11-14, 5-9) sizzled at 62 percent (31 of 50), including 65.4 percent (17 of 26) in the first half.

"We were very poor defensively Thursday, and we were even worse tonight," Garner said.

Southeast also didn't have a particularly good night offensively, shooting just 43.1 percent (25 of 58), including 34.5 percent on 3-pointers (10 of 29).

Senior forward Dainmon Gonner scored 23 points to lead Southeast, 18 coming in the first half. Senior guard Derek Winans had 15 points, while Golson and sophomore guard Terrick Willoughby added 11 each.

MSU got 23 points from junior guard Quinton Smith. He hit eight of 12 shots, including four of five 3-pointers. Senior forward Chad McKnight made six of seven shots and added 14 points.

The Redhawks held two early leads, the last 18-15 after Gonner's 3-pointer with just over 12 minutes left in the first half, but MSU controlled most of the action by way of its hot shooting.

The Eagles scored nine straight points to go up 24-18, then steadily pulled away to a 44-33 halftime advantage.

Southeast scored the first eight points of the second half to make it 44-41, and the Redhawks trailed just 49-44 when MSU used an 8-0 run to go ahead 57-44 with under 11 minutes left.

The Redhawks got no closer than 11 points the rest of the way as the Eagles cruised to victory.

"I think we had our worst performance in the eight years I've been here," Garner said. "We were very, very poor in all phases of the game. I don't have an answer why."

One of the few highlights for Southeast was freshman point guard Paul Paradoski's basket from just inside half court -- but it came at the game's final buzzer, when the outcome had long since been decided.