Southeast Missouri State men's basketball team eliminated from OVC tournament

Nashville, Tenn. -- It was just too little too late for the Southeast Missouri State men's basketball team.

The Redhawks attempted a comeback in the final minutes of their quarterfinal game of the Ohio Valley Conference tournament, but it wasn't enough.

Southeast's season ended with an 84-76 loss to Eastern Kentucky on Thursday night at Municipal Auditorium in Nashville, Tenn.

"You just can't spot a team like we spotted them and expect to be successful," Southeast coach Dickey Nutt said. "I thought their pressure bothered us early. I think we threw the ball away the first four out of five possessions, and I thought it set the tone. We had to play catch up the entire night, but I was really proud of our guys. They hung in there."

The Redhawks trailed by as many as 22 points in the game, and were down 77-62 with 1 minute, 56 seconds remaining.

They cut it to six points with 31 seconds remaining on a Jamaal Calvin 3-pointer. Jarekious Bradley hit a pair of 3-pointers just before that.

Southeast cut it to six once more on a 3-pointer from Calvin, but EKU iced the win with a pair of free throws.

EKUscored the first eight points of the game before Southeast got on the board after not scoring for the first 4 minutes, 37 seconds of the game.

Southeast senior Tyler Stone noted that having played a game the night before might've had something to do with the team's lack of energy at the start of the game, but he didn't want to use that as an excuse.

"We knew what to expect coming into the game. It's just like this sometimes," Stone said. "We could've easily folded, but we didn't. We were resilient. The whole time until the clock hit zero we thought we were going to win. We just ran out of time tonight. It just happens like that. It's not where I wanted to see us. I had a lot bigger things planned for our team, but sometimes it doesn't go your way and you've got to learn from it."

Stone tried to carry the Southeast offense in the second half, scoring 15 of his 17 points, but nearly every time the Redhawks would come up with a run on the offensive end it seemed like the Colonels would counter it.

Southeast was finally able to get some stops on the defensive end when they started trapping near half-court.

"They came out of the gate with a higher energy. We didn't match their intensity early on," Stone said. "They were just attacking the glass. We had to find a way to stop them and finally we figured out pressing and trapping, so keep trapping them and it started working. We didn't lose, though -- we just ran out of time tonight."

The Redhawks found themselves down 39-25 at halftime. EKU shot 57.1 percent (8 of 14) from behind the arc in the first half with Orlando Williams hitting all four of his attempts.

EKU led by as many as 20 during the half, and Southeast used a 10-0 run over a three-minute stretch to cut it to 32-22 with 1:46 remaining.

The Redhawks shot 38.1 percent (8 of 21) from the field in the first 20 minutes. They shot 53.3 percent (16 of 30) in the second half and knocked down 8 of 16 from behind the arc.

EKU coach Jeff Neubauer was pleased with his team's defense in the first half, and noted the play of OVC Defensive Player of the Year Corey Walden.

"There were two aspects that really made a difference," Neubauer said. "We held them to 25 points because we didn't give up any transition points in the first half. SEMO loves to run, that's how they score. That's why they're averaging so many points. But Corey did a great job on [Lucas] Nutt in the first half, just stopping the break, and then our other guys did a great job getting back. Then we finished possessions. That was a tremendous rebounding half for us."

The Colonels ended Southeast's season for the second year in a row, and move on to face No. 2 Murray State in the semifinals at 9 p.m. today.

Southeast finished the season with a record of 18-14.

Three players scored double-figures in addition to Stone. Bradley finished with 18, Calvin had 17 and Nino Johnson had 10. Johnson also had a game-high 11 rebounds.

"I feel like the future's going to be good. I think it's going to be bright," Nutt said. "We've just got to get better and better, and we'll be back next year. All in all our guys had a good year. Did we have a great year? No, but we had a good year and these guys grew up. The stats won't ever tell just how much this team grew up in terms of maturity. That's what I'm most proud of."