Redhawks basketball lags in graduation

While still well below the national average, the Southeast Missouri State men's basketball program has improved its graduation rate.

Figures released Tuesday by the NCAA showed that Southeast men's basketball had a 25 percent graduation rate for athletes who enrolled from 1998 to 2001.

The graduation rates include only athletes on scholarship, and they must have graduated within six years of enrolling.

Last year's figures showed Southeast having the second-worst graduation rate — 14 percent — among all NCAA Division I programs.

The NCAA Division I average graduation rate for men's basketball released Tuesday was 62 percent.

Many of Southeast's sports continued to fare well.

Three women's sports — gymnastics, volleyball and tennis — had perfect 100 percent graduation rates.

Women's soccer (89 percent), women's track/cross country (88 percent), women's softball (83 percent) and men's track/cross country (79 percent) all fared well.

Other Southeast sports and their graduation rates were women's basketball at 59 percent, football at 52 percent and baseball at 44 percent.

Women's assistant hired

Southeast women's basketball coach John Ishee has rounded out his staff with the addition of Jayme Callahan. She joins fellow assistants Chris Harris and Elizabeth Cansdale.

Callahan spent the past two seasons as head coach at Division III Webster University in St. Louis, going 17-33. She also served as Webster's NCAA compliance coordinator.

Callahan, a St. Louis native, was a four-year starting point guard at Missouri Southern, where she is that Division II program's career steals leader while ranking second in career assists.

"We're extremely pleased to have Jayme join our team, and my staff," Ishee said in a release. "She will be invaluable to us in knowing and recruiting the St. Louis area and helping in all facets of our program."