Redhawks will have national audience at EIU

~ The Southeast men will have Saturday's OVC game air on ESPNU

The Southeast Missouri State men's basketball team has a chance to show the country how much it has improved under first-year coach Dickey Nutt.

As part of the Ohio Valley Conference's national television package, Saturday's 11 a.m. game at Eastern Illinois will air on ESPNU.

"This is a great opportunity for our program, to be able to go on a national stage, play in front of a national audience and see the improvement we've made. Hopefully we'll show some improvement," Nutt said. "It's a tremendous opportunity to help get our recruiting going.

"This is great exposure for our program. I can assure you we'll make 50 phone calls the day before telling every recruit we're recruiting to watch us play on ESPN. Hopefully we can play well."

Southeast played well in its most recent outing, Monday's 78-66 home win over Jacksonville State.

"I was really proud of the way we played, especially our start," Nutt said after the Redhawks led Jacksonville State from wire to wire.

Despite being just 5-9 overall against a rugged nonconference schedule, the Redhawks have largely exceeded OVC expectations so far with a 2-2 conference mark after being picked to finish dead last in the 10-team league.

But building on that OVC record won't be easy over the next week as the Redhawks face three straight road games against squads expected to be among the league's top units.

That begins Saturday in Charleston, Ill., against EIU (9-5, 3-1) and continues next week with games at Morehead State and Eastern Kentucky, who entered Thursday's action also 3-1 in the conference.

"It's a tough stretch right now," Nutt said. "We just want to keep getting better and see what happens."

EIU is a defensive minded team as the Panthers rank second in the OVC in points allowed (65.9 per game) and field-goal percentage defense (40.1).

But the Panthers in the past week have shown they can play various styles during a pair of home wins. They beat Jacksonville State 50-48 on Saturday and Tennessee Tech 97-93 in overtime on Monday.

"They're a very tough opponent. They'll try to slow it down and grind it out," Nutt said. "We've got to go in with a lot of confidence."

Junior guard Anthony Allison, who leads the OVC in 3-point shooting at 51.4 percent (18 of 35) and tops Southeast in scoring with an 11.1 average, said the Redhawks are preparing for a battle Saturday.

"They're a good team. We have to get into the mindset that we're going to be in a dogfight," Allison said.

The Redhawks already have won an OVC road game, beating Tennessee State 74-66 on Dec. 5. That came two days after they suffered a 76-71 overtime loss at perennial OVC power Austin Peay.

"It's never easy to win on the road," Nutt said. "But we have played some good games on the road already this season."

Tyler Laser, a 6-foot-1 junior guard, leads EIU offensively with a 14.1 average.

Romain Martin, a 6-3 senior guard, is among the OVC's premier players when healthy, but he has battled injury problems during his career.

Martin, EIU's leading scorer each of the past three seasons, recently returned to action after missing the first 10 games. The former OVC freshman of the year is averaging just 4.8 points in limited minutes.

EIU has a veteran inside presence in 6-8, 250-pound senior center Ousmane Cisse, a four-year starter who is averaging 5.8 points and 6.1 rebounds.

"They're a very good team and they've been kind of pointing to this year," Nutt said. "We've got a big challenge in front of us, but we're looking forward to it."