Hinson not all disappointed with Salukis' defense in opener

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No basketball coach in America is happy with his or her team today, but SIU men's basketball coach Barry Hinson put a little bit of a bow on his team's defensive performance at Saint Louis on Saturday night.

The Billikens made 8 of 15 from the 3-point line, including two clutch treys in the final two minutes to beat the Salukis 62-59, but shot 40.5 percent for the game. Considering one of SIU's best defensive players, junior guard Anthony Beane, sat for 21 minutes because of foul trouble, and the Salukis played five guys who'd never competed in a Division I game, at a sold-out arena, the third-year coach had to tip his cap a bit to the effort.

"Two of the 3s that came at very difficult times were set plays that were executed extremely well," Hinson said. "We didn't communicate at our end, defensively, and just some of their 3s came off offensive rebounds or in transition, and those are the best times to shoot 3s, when everybody is scrambling and everybody is trying to find somebody. Defensively, we held them to 62 points and 40 percent field goal percentage, if I can do that night in and night out, I'll take that to the house every night."

Beane, SIU's leading returning scorer from last season, still got 14 points in 19 minutes. Sophomore forward Sean O'Brien had his third career double-double with 15 points and 12 rebounds, and Tyler Smithpeters added nine points at Chaifetz Arena. Redshirt freshman guard K.C. Goodwin played pretty good defense and scored four points to go with his five rebounds. Goodwin's five boards were the second-most on the team, and his three assists and three steals in 28 minutes led the team.

Saint Louis guard Austin McBroom led the Billikens with a career-high 24 points, including the game-winning 3-pointer from about 22 feet out in the final five seconds.

SIU (0-1) travels to Tennessee State tonight for a 7 p.m. game in Nashville, Tennessee. The Salukis are 12-7 against the Tigers, but the two teams have only met twice in the last 48 years. SIU won home games in 1989 (99-65) and 2004 (83-60). The Tigers are coached by Tamms native Dana Ford, a former assistant coach at Wichita State, Chipola (Fla.) College and Illinois State.

 

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Tamms native Ford orchestrates 'minor miracle' at TSU



Dana Ford orchestrated a "minor miracle" in his first two months as the head men's basketball coach at Tennessee State.

Ford, a Tamms native who played at Illinois State from 2002-06, was named the new coach for the Tigers in April. Four players asked to leave the program on his first day, leaving him with three remaining players. Two ended up leaving the program, with senior guard Jay Harris the lone returnee left. Ford and assistant coaches Randy Peele (associate head coach), Rodney Hamilton and Pierre Jordan signed 12 players in less than two months.

"Just having a team this year is a minor miracle, and I'm being honest," Ford said. "To sign 12 players in a calendar year is unheard of. To do it in eight weeks is unbelievable."

Six of his 13 players are true freshmen, and four are expected to start against SIU (0-1) tonight when the Tigers (1-0) compete at the Gentry Center in Nashville, Tennessee. Guards Charles Tucker, Darreon Reddick and forwards Zachary Lee and Demontez Loman are expected to start against the Salukis along with Harris, who had 18 points in the season opener against Reinhardt on Friday night.

Reddick was highly recruited out of Belleville East High School near St. Louis. The 6-foot-4, 195-pound guard made 6 of 7 from the field and 3 of 5 at the free-throw line against Reinhardt, an NAIA opponent. Marcus Roper, a 6-5 junior from the New Mexico Military Institute, scored a game-high 23 points off the bench for the Tigers in their 97-66 win.

Two players are sitting out for Tennessee State this season per NCAA transfer rules, 6-4 junior guard Tahjere McCall out of Niagara and 6-2 junior guard Keron Deshields from Montana.

"A lot of them were available when we got the job," Ford said. "You interview for a job, and you've gotta wait the process out. When we got the job, we just kept following up on kids. Anybody that returned our texts or emails, we followed up on. Assistants followed up on kids. We sold playing time."

Kids came from all over. None of Ford's first 13-player squad is from Nashville or the state of Tennessee. In fact, 10 different states are represented on his roster, with two players from Nigeria, 6-9 freshman forward Christian Mekowlu and 6-11 freshman center Chima Azuonwu.

Ford played eight guys in Friday's season opener. He is expected to be without two forwards tonight against SIU due to knee injuries, Mekowlu and 6-6 junior Christian Crockett.

SIU will be without center Ibby Djimde for 4-6 weeks, Saluki coach Barry Hinson announced on Monday, because of a lingering knee injury. Djimde played 21 minutes at Saint Louis on Saturday night and scored five points off the bench. The injury will put some pressure on forward Bola Olaniyan to stay in the game a bit longer than he has, recently, because of foul trouble, and probably opens the door for freshman forward Jordan Caroline and 7-foot junior Deng Leek to get additional minutes.

Caroline, however, is playing with a high ankle sprain suffered before the season. Of course, Hinson called the 6-7, 235-pound right-hander the most athletic guy on the team even on one leg. Leek hasn't played since the first exhibition game against St. Mary (Kansas), an NAIA team.

SIU may be able to play smaller against Tennessee State, however, as the Tigers want to get up and down the court. Tennessee State had 21 assists on 35 baskets against Reinhardt, but also 18 turnovers.

"We gotta do a good job of taking care of the ball, and not let them get out in fast-break opportunities without our defense in place," Ford said. "That's one way we can control (the tempo.) The second way is to take good shots."

Hinson expects another good atmosphere to challenge his club tonight. The Gentry Center will not likely be sold out - only 1,238 showed up to see the Tigers play Reinhardt - but the Salukis give Tennessee State a good mid-major opponent and its first Division I opponent of the season.

"We know we're going to play a team that's excited, because this will be their first Division I game at Tennessee State, with their new coach, and its the first game we've played there," Hinson said. "It's got electric written all over it. We just gotta come in there and play our best basketball."