Southeast Missouri State women's basketball team seeks first winning streak

~ The Redhawks are coming off an OVC win vs. Eastern Illinois

When Southeast Missouri State senior guard Jordan Hunter explained her individual success against Ohio Valley Conference opponents following Southeast's game Saturday night, it became clear that the team's confidence is on an upswing.

"The coaches have told me to keep being aggressive and I guess by attacking more, either I'm open or my teammates are open," Hunter said about her 22 points and eight rebounds against Eastern Illinois.

So where'd her nine rebounds come from?

"I wanted some rebounds, so I stole them from Trish [Mack]," Hunter said with a laugh.

The Redhawks picked up a much-needed 66-49 win against OVC West Division opponent EIU on Saturday and have a chance to do something they have yet to do this season: Win two games in a row.

"[Saturday] we definitely understood where we're at in the season and the importance of every game from here on out," Southeast coach Ty Margenthaler said. "[We're going to] try to get ourselves in the mix and hopefully make some strong noise here down the stretch."

Southeast is 6-13 and 2-4 in the OVC. The Redhawks currently sit in fourth place in the OVC West standings, just one spot ahead of SIU Edwardsville.

The Redhawks and Cougars (5-15, 2-6) play at 6:30 p.m. today at the Show Me Center. SIUE will look to snap a two-game losing streak.

"It's really not so much about SIU Edwardsville," Margenthaler said. "It's about us, about us continuing to get better."

Southeast took some steps toward getting better in the win against EIU, which sits in third in the West Division standings. The Redhawks outrebounded the top-rebounding defense in the conference and held Sabina Oroszova, the seventh-leading scorer in the conference, to 12 points. Senior forward Patricia Mack guarded her for most of the game.

"It made our jobs easier too," junior guard Allyson Bradshaw said of Mack's defense. "When she can guard No. 10 one-on-one, then it makes our gap shorter, which makes our close-out shorter, which just makes it all easier."

That's almost exactly what Margenthaler said will be needed to stop the "guard-oriented" Cougars.

"They like to get to the basket. They shoot the ball pretty well," Margenthaler said. "They're a little bit different than they were last year with Raven Berry inside. Being the big kid they really went inside a lot to her. We're going to have to defend one-on-one really well. We're going to be tested on one-on-one defense, but I like where our guards are at. I like where our team defense is growing."

The Redhawks no longer have to worry about the graduated all-OVC Berry, who had a 28-point and 13-rebound game and a 25-point and 11-rebound game against Southeast last season.

Southeast split games with the Cougars last year, losing 78-65 on the road and winning 67-62 at home.

SIUE has three players averaging double figures in conference play: junior guard Tierny Austin with 14.3, freshman forward Micah Jones with 12.8 and sophomore guard Coco Moore with 12.4.

SIUE is coming off an 111-72 loss to three-time defending OVC Tournament champion UT-Martin on Saturday.