Catching up...again

Good afternoon Cougar nation. I apologize for my unforeseen absence as of late keeping up the blog. We have missed a ton.

Quick update: I am a "professionally unemployed journalist" washing dishes at a local restaurant to pay my rent. It's a blast.

The job has me working on Saturday nights and that has caused me to miss a few games. I won't be able to make the finale and bracketbuster game against Northern Illinois Saturday because of it. Have to do what I have to do I guess.

The Cougars have probably exceeded our expectations, as if there were expectations to begin with. After the opener at Illinois I was adamant in thinking this was a 12 win team. Right now, SIUE is 7-15 with five games to play. We probably won't get to 12, but 10? Maybe.

SIUE is not a terrible basketball team. There have been moments where they have definitely looked like one, but on the other hand they are playing respectable basketball. Kris Davis has been a bright spot and possibly the Steph Curry we desperately need. Guys are fitting into their roles, and it's obvious that the team is becoming more talented as time progresses. Last year, David Boarden was a starter. This year he is the last guy off the bench. Kevin Stineman started the year as the team's starting point guard but the emergence of Davis has limited his minutes and put him into a more fitting role off the bench.

Kevin isn't flashy and doesn't score much, but he doesn't make careless mistakes either, so he is a nice guy to have in a limited capacity. Davis is one of the best 3-point shooters in the country. That's a great pickup.

So, how many games has eCougarzone.com missed? six, to be exact. How many have I seen in person? two.


Murray State 82, SIUE 65

When we last left you we were preparing to take on the No. 10 team in the country and the final unbeaten in the world of college basketball. To top it off, the game was televised on ESPNU, a first for SIUE. Courtside, stringing a story for the Edwardsville Intelligencer, I was visibly nervous, as the Vadalabene Center filled up an hour before tip off with alternating chants of SI and UE beckoning from the student section. I had never been prouder of my school.

The Cougars put up a fight. Never mind ESPN missed the good part, cutting into the game at the first media timeout with SIUE ahead 12-10. The Racers went on to show their superiority, going on a ridiculous 16-0 run in under 3 minutes to take a commanding 26-12 lead. The short stretch may as well have been the basketball game.

Jacksonville State 76, SIUE 65

SIUE's slide continued. This was their fifth straight loss and there was absolutely nothing I could do about it but helplessly watch the ESPN Gamecast on my iPhone. It was a frustrating night for me.

The Cougars had 19 turnovers and the Gamecocks scored 26 points off of them. SIUE kept it close through a 15-6 run, but the turnovers made the game.


Tennessee Tech 98, SIUE 80

SIUE held Kevin Murphy to 1-16 from the field and defeated the Golden Eagles earlier this year. On this day, he dropped an NCAA-season-high FIFTY (50) 5-0 points on SIUE.

It was the Kevin Murphy show, a performance worthy of praise. He was nominated for, and won the Capital One performance of the week, earning his pixelated highlights some airtime on SportsCenter.

There was no stopping him despite scoring 80 points for the third time this year. The other two came in the earlier game against Tennessee Tech (83) and a win over Robert Morris-Springfield (That doesn't really count.)

Any time on SportsCenter with the Cougars in it is a plus. One of these days we will turn the table.

SIUE 61, Morehead State 53

Morehead State is down this year because of the departure of Kenneth Faried to graduation and the NBA. That's life in college athletics. You can't sign these guys to long-term contracts. Faried was the backbone to this team. During shootaround, they were noticeably smaller and lacked that unmistakable force. This turned out to be a good thing.

Morehead State, despite being a completely different team is still the same Morehead State that defeated Louisville in the first  second round of the NCAA tournament last year. They still have Demonte Harper who lit up the Cougars in their game at the Vadalabene Center last season. Donnie Tyndall is still their head coach. The Eagles are still dangerous.

This was a defensive battle and Morehead State really never got going. It was one of those games where you slowly build up a decent lead but expect the other team to eventually make some kind of run and make everyone completely uncomfortable.

Thankfully, that never happened.

SIUE 80, Eastern Kentucky 74

ESPN Gamecast is probably the most nerve-wracking way to watch a basketball game you should be at and limits productivity. That's fine with me. I hate my job.

Southeast Missouri State 85, SIUE 72

Help me out with this one in the comments section. Another game I missed and probably the outcome we should have expected. It seems to me this one was very similar to the first game in Cape Girardeau. The Cougars kept it close into the second half but fell short to a better team. I am a believer in SEMO. They are much improved and Dickie Nutt has a few valuable pieces. Murray State may be an insurmountable hurdle for them to overcome even past this season, but SEMO is going to only get better, as will SIUE.



Here's a stat I tweeted out courtesy of the awesome statbot @SIUEball.


The Cougars have lost 100% of the time this season (0-7) after shooting a three point percentage of 39.1% or worse....

Chew on that.

Up next: Eastern Illinois and Northern Illinois

Wednesday, SIUE travels to Charleston for another shot at the struggling Panthers. At the VC, SIUE put forth a very uninspiring performance in a 73-59 loss. Joey Miller, the son of the coach with the hottest seat in the conference put together a surprising 24 point performance while the Cougars shot just 27 percent of their shots in the first half and couldn't dig out of a 34-21 halftime hole.

I think this was just an off-night and EIU is beatable if SIUE plays their game and makes some shots. It will be difficult though traveling into Lantz Arena.

I am skeptical when it comes to Bracketbusters. I didn't want ESPN to send Towson, Liberty or a school 85 percent of the student body hasn't heard of into the VC. Thankfully, they used their head and gave us Northern Illinois, a team everyone is familiar with from a conference everyone should be familiar with (the MAC).

The Huskies are just bad. NIU is 3-20. They beat Roosevelt (whoever that is) and have two wins in the MAC over Miami (Ohio) and Central Michigan. They lost by 13 to Carbondale, which may be better than we did down there but hey, we didn't lose to Purdue 96-34 in front of 14,000 fans.

The NIU offense isn't deep. Tim Toler and Abdel Nader average 10 points per game but after that there is a huge drop off. I can see a victory here, but won't guarantee anything at all.

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If you don't hear from me the tweetline is open @AllanjLewis. I feel like it's my duty to keep this blog going and that I have let you all down. We have five games left. Let's try to get to 10 wins.

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