SALUKIS FLATTEN INDIANS AGAIN 62-51

CARBONDALE, Ill. -- The Southern Illinois hex lives on for Southeast Missouri State University's men's basketball team.

Southeast had another less than stellar performance against the Salukis Sunday afternoon, dropping a 62-51 decision in front of 4,824 fans at the SIU Arena.

For the Indians, who fell to 8-2, it was their seventh consecutive loss to the Salukis since the series was resumed during the 1993-94 season.

And since Gary Garner took over as Southeast's coach three years ago, the Indians have lost the three games against the Salukis by an average of 17 points, with Sunday's result being the closest among the three.

"It's always more frustrating when you don't play well," said Garner after being asked how frustrating it was for his team to play poorly against the Salukis every year. "But it's more frustrating if you don't play hard and the effort is not there, which was definitely not the case today."

Indeed, Garner lauded the effort of the Indians, who played well defensively and held a 43 to 32 rebounding edge.

But the Indians struggled offensively virtually the entire contest, shooting just 35 percent from the field (18 of 52) and committing 27 turnovers.

Some of Southeast's offensive woes can be attributed to solid defense by SIU. But some of the Indians' offensive problems might also be traced to the fact Southeast had been idle since a win at Bradley on Dec. 22.

"I thought we had great effort. You don't outrebound your opponent by 11 without great effort. I was proud of the team for that," Garner said. "But we were just really out of sync offensively the whole game. We had 27 turnovers and a lot of them were unforced errors.

"They're a really good defensive team, but no better than Bradley. We did a lot of things out of character."

Asked how much the layoff might have affected his team, Garner said, "I don't want to ever make excuses. But I think the layoff really hurt us. I was worried about that from day one. Our defense held us in there the whole game, but we just could never get anything going offensively."

SIU coach Bruce Weber, whose squad improved to 7-5, lauded the defensive effort of the Salukis.

"They're a pretty good ballclub and I think we defended them pretty well," Weber said. "We really put good pressure on the ball and I think that was the key."

Mike Branson was Southeast's only double-figure scorer as he put in 11 points. Branson went down with a leg injury early in the second half and had to be helped off the court, but he returned a few minutes later and appeared to be fine.

Roderick Johnson added eight points and pulled down a team-high eight rebounds for the Indians while Brian Bunche also contributed eight points.

Derrick Tillmon paced the Salukis with 12 points. Kent Williams and Joshua Cross both scored 10 while Chris Thunell grabbed a game-high 10 rebounds.

"I think they have a great team and I wish them the best," said Tillmon of the Indians. "We just had to come out and play hard, outscrap them."

While the game ultimately turned into a blowout down the stretch, it sure didn't look that way for the entire first half and part of the second half.

Southeast grabbed an early 7-2 advantage to mark the Indians' biggest lead of the afternoon.

SIU came back with five straight points and the lead changed hands numerous times after that, with neither squad holding more than a five-point edge the rest of the half.

The Salukis used a 6-0 run to go ahead 31-26 late in the opening period, but Michael Stokes scored just before the buzzer to pull the Indians to within 31-28 at the break.

Southeast scored the first four points of the second half, getting two free throws by Bunche and a 15-footer by Stokes, to go ahead 32-31.

But that would be the Indians' last lead. Thunell's follow shot just 1:02 into the final half put SIU ahead 33-32 and the Salukis would not trail again as the Indians went into a real offensive funk.

The Indians were still hanging close at 44-39 after a jumper by Stokes with 13:32 remaining. But Southeast then endured a scoreless drought of 9:27 as SIU took control of the contest.

Ricky Collum's 3-pointer at the 11:08 mark put SIU ahead 47-39 and two Williams free throws with 9:36 left made it 49-39 as the Indians were in serious trouble.

Although the Salukis didn't actually light up the scoreboard for the remainder of Southeast's drought, the Indians could do nothing offensively.

By the time Southeast scored again -- as Antonio Short made one of two free throws with 4:05 left -- the Indians trailed 53-40.

"We wanted to keep pressure on them," said Collum. "We held them to 39 for a long time and that's a credit to us. We were playing hard."

SIU later built a 57-40 lead and the Salukis were still up by 17 at 62-45 before Southeast was able to score the game's final six points to make things a bit more respectable.

INDIAN NOTES: Garner was pleased with the return of Short, the Indians' former starting shooting guard who averaged 11 points during the first two games of the season before suffering a broken right wrist.

Short missed the next seven games before returning Sunday. In 16 minutes, he scored seven points and grabbed three rebounds.

"It was good to have Antonio back," said Garner. "I thought he played well."...

Southeast is now through with all its non-league games. The Indians, 1-0 in Ohio Valley Conference play, will resume OVC action Thursday night when Tennessee State visits the Show Me Center.