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| Abel's aftermath - photo by Allan Lewis |
Just days after losing to Iowa by 61 points, there was a real different feel to what the SIUE Cougars were doing on the basketball court. Amanda Levens had just led her women's team to an impressive 62-55 victory over Saint Louis University in the first game of a double-header, and I couldn't help but thinking what it would be like if the men's team was able to play a game with the same emotion and swagger of their women's counterpart.
Then, just as it were, the men gave that effort against Morehead State.
It still wasn't good enough to win, and thanks to a 15-1 run, the Cougars were defeated by 19.
That wasn't the whole story at the Vadalabene Center, and for the first time this season I have been able to hold my head high after an SIUE basketball game. The exhibition win against Webster was bad. The game against IPFW was frustrating. Even the Cougars win against Division III MacMurray left a bad taste in my mouth. Then, I turned the TV off against Iowa.
I held the notion that the Cougars had rolled over and died. They called the season off and really didn't care if they beat a Division I team from a state without Dakota in its name on its home floor this season.
The last time out, they fell by a program high 61 points to a team by all intensive purposes they had the talent to defeat.
Let's be honest, Iowa sucks.
I was wrong.
Okay, so a 19 point loss at home is nothing to brag about, but Morehead State is a complete basketball team. If the OVC wasn't the OVC, they would have been alongside Murray State in the NCAA tournament last season. David Boarden, Morehead State coach Donnie Tyndall and Lennox Forrester all recognized it after the game. Faried had scouts from the Miami Heat and Philadelphia 76ers in Edwardsville to watch him effortlessly score 25 and grab 20 rebounds.
Those numbers are insane.
What happened on that floor today was to a point, inspiring. Iowa handed our asses to ourselves. What's over is done. The 1967 SIUE team didn't stop playing after losing 109-48 against UMSL in its first ever basketball game, and 39 years later that team was in the Division II Elite Eight. Now, they are a Division I team we can routinely critique and break down, complete with the occasional nationally televised game.
The program has grown since that loss, and SIUE took a step in the right direction after its second 61 point loss, and worst against a Division I opponent.
The players know they have been mailing it in this season without Mark Yelovich and they don't deny it. David Boarden said this.
"After the Iowa game we sat down in the locker room. That was the longest we have ever been in the locker room after the game. Coach said some motivational things. Mike Messer, a freshmen had some good things to say. Kevin Stineman stepped up. We made up our minds. We need to come out stronger and we need to play a lot better. We feel like we haven't given it all we have and tried to do that."
The difference, albeit in defeat was noticeable. We can critique this team and say they suck. That's probably a correct thing to say at this point. We don't expect a perfect season, after all, those don't happen anywhere in the country. Even if this team did go undefeated, it would be a complete waste because we are postseason ineligible. All we ask for is for this team to try.
They did that tonight.
SIUE was unable to turn in a compete 40 minute effort, and ultimately, that was what doomed them. Morehead State used a full court zone press the entire game, and even though the Cougars did a fairly good job getting out of it early, creating some good shots and open looks, they had a letdown, and that is expected. 40 minutes against the press, Demonte Harper (35 points) and that Faried fellow are hard to come out of alive. This team was beat by Florida by five in Gainsville.
Morehead State is the real deal, and looking back at it, tonight was not that bad. It is something to learn from. If you play with confidence and play with some sort of urgency and desire good things will happen. Nobody had their heads down today. That is not something we are used to. Something was different from the start.
Let's look back at the season so far starting games. It has not been pretty.
Webster led SIUE 15-7. IPFW led SIUE 10-2 and 20-7. Illinois State led SIUE 15-2. Eastern Kentucky led SIUE 13-4. MacMurray and Cody Best led SIUE at halftime. Iowa?...well, yeah.
"That was refreshing. Our guys were ready to compete tonight and it all started with practice yesterday. We got after it," Forrester said. "They brought that over to the game time and it was nice not trying to dig out of a 14-0 run or whatever we were continuing to fight out of."
The Cougars had a five point lead with a good chunk of time left in the first half and traded baskets early tonight. They forced turnovers, while Dob Mavrak of all people almost had Frank DiLeo, the 76ers scout sitting next to me headed for the exits.
We couldn't hang, but we hung.
Coach Forrester was brutally honest after the game.
"It's on me. I'm the captain. I'm the leader. I'm the head coach. It's all me. We got beat by 61 the other night and the only person you can point the finger at is me. I never blame anyone on this team but myself. When I look back at how we get beat I always look at what I could have done to get us better prepared, to execute better. Play hard. Focus. I point the finger at myself first and that's what I did after the Iowa game. I look it the mirror and ask myself have I prepared these guys to be successful? I failed
to do that. Whether we win or lose I can tell you one thing. We are going to bet better every day."
I am buying in to it.
It's hard on everybody. Forrester, the fans and even Mark Yelovich, and Forrester gave insight into his mindset right now, injured for the season.
"All you can think about when you are healthy is I can do something to help, but when you have a broken foot and can't play that's the hardest part...watching your team struggle. He worked so hard to throw a year away and is making the right decision [redshirting] I was in the same boat my first year at Evansville. The hardest thing is to watch your team lose. It hurts more than your injury."
What I am trying to get to is maybe, hopefully this team has a new outlook after getting pummeled in Iowa City. They know things need to change. Today was a step in the right direction. Abel Tillman and Gerald Jones are both finally un-suspended and playing basketball. Jones had 10 points and Tillman threw down the sickest most earth-shattering dunk I have ever seen (de-throning LeShaun Murphy's against MacMurray.) He took a pass underneath the basket by Dob after a steal, stood up to Kenneth Faried, said you know what? we can do this too, dislodged the shot clock and literally brought the basket to its knees, delaying the game.
It could be a sign of things to come. We just need to keep in mind the future is bright here. We are still an Independent, and we may not be all that great now, but the women's team showed us today it is possible.
Heart beats talent 80 percent of nights, and 95 percent of statistics are made up, so let's see some.
6 comments:
iowa sucks?
dude we suck and that statement that we have the talent to beat them is so far from false we lost by 61 POINTS, they are a big ten school who gets recruits all over the midwest, we are an indpendent that gets players from STL and JUCOs
and this game
we still lost by 19 on our home floor
a loss is a loss
its dumb to say they can learn from it since they techinally still got blown out at home
dont really get why u think there is an optimism for this team without mark
aint gonna happen
Right now for SIUE, a loss is a loss, but some are worse than others. This was not a good loss, yeah, it was 19 points and we were at home. Morehead State is going to beat other teams by more than 19 on the road. SIUE was in this game for a majority of it, they had one letdown and that was the ballgame. It's a step in the right direction after Friday's debacle. As far as this year goes, no. There is no real optimism. This year is lost, but that is okay, we can't get anything from it either way. If we play like we did today we can beat OVC teams. At this rate, 3 Division I wins this year is progress, and not unreachable with this schedule. The loss to Iowa was a good thing, because it shows this team they can't dick around and expect to be a good basketball team. They are not. Iowa is in rebuilding mode, and has the losses to show for it. We are not 61 points worse than Iowa, maybe 40 on a bad night. Friday was the worst night they could have possibly had.
There were enough good things going on out there today to put a positive spin on it. In the end, we lost. We played 30 great minutes and 10 bad ones. That's the hardest part in this game, putting it together for 40 minutes. Kenneth Faried is better than anyone Iowa has had since Ricky Davis, and he is better.
The optimism without Mark comes two years from now when this all actually counts. We have to look at the big picture with SIUE, because right now there isn't much.
Tonight was encouraging if anything.
Where is the video for the dunk??? Anyways I only watched the end of the game unfortunatley so I may be a little biased here but I thought the team looked like the wanted to play a lil more....yeah they were getting beat down the floor but Ihave stated it on here before the big difference between SIUE and other teams is that they hit shots and we do not plain and simple.....yeah defense would help but I saw where guys were hitting shots for MSU contested....and SIue had lot of open looks but we had the wrong guys shooting them......I am pumped for Abel and Jones for next year if they stay...both guys look good...Jones was very aggressive....Is Wickware injured and playing through it? He just does not look healthy....Chatt he is ok but I hate that he is not very aggressive......I think if Abel wants to be a big time player he just has to give the effort and stay off the BUD!!!
Was def a lot happier with this game. Coach is back on my good side again. haha. What a difference a game makes. I think we can win a game or two at vegas now at least. Wednesday will be a good test. tech has had a rough go so far too.
On another note I got an email today for the new mascot. They want people to choose between eddie and champ. I think I am going with eddie. Champ the cougar just sounds wrong seeing how we are playing. Also I like that it is a real name. Not sure I like either name but those are the choices.
I voted for Eddie too, rather go with Cory the destructor though
I will make my true opinion once we play a couple more games. Very impressed with the last one though. We are going uphill. Tillman and Jones will be phenominal next year.
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