Southeast Missouri State men's basketball team steps out of OVC play tonight

~ Southeast men play their final nonconference game against UMKC

Southeast Missouri State men's basketball coach Dickey Nutt knows that his team's 3-5 start in the Ohio Valley Conference isn't where the Redhawks would've expected to be at this point in the season.

He also knows that his team still has eight regular-season OVC games remaining and wants the team to only look forward for the remainder of the season.

"I think the word we want to use, the word I used on Sunday [in practice] is I want everybody to understand our philosophy right now is N-E-X-T," Nutt said of what he explained to his players. "'What's next? I don't want to look in the rearview mirror. I don't want anybody telling me about our record. The only word I want you to use is next,' and if we'll do that, then we're going to be fine."

Southeast's next opportunity happens to be its last nonconference game of the season.

The Redhawks face Missouri-Kansas City at 7 p.m. tonight at the Show Me Center.

Nutt said the game will be important for the Redhawks' confidence and "for learning how to play on our home floor."

Southeast is coming off a 77-74 loss at home to Eastern Illinois. The Redhawks shot a season-low 19 percent from behind the arc in the loss, which Nutt said was just "a bad shooting night" and not EIU's defense.

"Right now we're really inconsistent, and we're working on that. We're working as hard as we can on that," Nutt said. "There's no secret, we're not playing our best basketball right now and obviously dropped a game that we should have won. In all honesty, we should have won that game, and anytime we're at home we're expected to win. I do think we have arrived at a level where we're expected to win our home games, and hopefully we can improve in the areas we're struggling with and become a better team."

The Redhawks are feeling some pressure after their unexpected slow start in conference play. Nutt said he explained to his players that although they were picked as the OVC West Division favorites in the preseason, the team was expected to have five returning starters, which he said included AJ Jones and Michael Porter. Jones, who started 24 games last year, withdrew from the university before Southeast's season opener against Saint Louis. Porter, who did not start last year and played just one game due to a broken foot, had his career ended due to a series of injuries.

"We don't get started too good in our conference race and predictions are sky-high, and the next thing you know our guys are reeling and spiraling because they feel like they have let down the world, and we've got to get out of that. We've got to get away from that," Nutt said. "We're playing with added pressure. You can't play this game with pressure. You can't play this game with a lack of confidence. That's what we're trying hard every day to have the mindset just to go out and relax and play."

Southeast (11-10) likely be without leading scorer Jarekious Bradley as it looks to pick up its ninth nonconference win this season. Nutt said it was "doubtful" that Bradley would play due to a sprained knee.

UMKC (7-12, 4-3) is led in scoring by Martez Harrison with 16.3 ppg.

"We're really going to have to do a good job of guarding the dribble, making sure that we have an extra nose on that ball to get him stopped and corralled," Nutt said about Harrison.

Nelson Kirksey and Trinity Hall average 13.8 and 10.8 ppg, respectively, for the Kangaroos.

"They're very athletic, very long, and they're going to trap you all over the floor. We've got to be able to handle their pressure," Nutt said. "But we ought to be able to have our way inside the paint, and that's what we want to do. We want Tyler Stone and Nino Johnson and Josh Langford to get inside that paint and make some business. If we do that, we're going to be OK."

Stone is averaging 18.2 points and 9.3 rebounds per game while Johnson averages 7.9 ppg and 6.1 rpg. Langford averages 7.1 ppg and 4.0 rebounds.