Braviere: Well, coach I guess there’s another log jam up top of the conference with your team’s win over Tennessee Tech, and now there are four teams within one game of first place. Can you comment on how tough it will be with all of the positioning and the rest of the season?

Samuels: It could make you dizzy trying to figure out all of those tie-breakers, but tie breakers we are not worrying about. We just need to finish as strong as possible. Let those seedings fall as they may. We’re going to host. Our goal now is if we win the championship outright or tie for it – good. But let’s have momentum going into the post season.

Braviere: Many people may not be familiar with the tie-breakers in the Ohio Valley Conference and how they work. Is it head to head, then scoring margin, etc.?

Samuels: There is no scoring differential. It’s head to head first. Then if it can’t be decided, it goes from the top of the league down. So let’s say we tie with Tennessee Tech, we split head to head, so it would go to our record against the third place team and on down. If it gets all the way down to the bottom and it still can’t be decided, then it is a coin flip. But if there is a three-way tie, you add up all of the wins and losses of the three teams and if there is a clear advantage, then that team wins the championship.

Braviere: So, I guess I’ll need a class to figure out how the tie-breakers work?

Samuels: You might, it really is confusing.

Braviere: Austin Peay plays Tennessee Tech on Thursday. You have to have an interest in that game. Which team would you rather see win?

Samuels: Well, actually if we look to the end, a better scenario would probably be Tech winning that one. Because that would drop Peay out of a would-be tie at the end. Then we hope that Tech loses to Murray or Tennessee-Martin, and we win out.

Braviere: This weekend you guys go back on the road where you may not have had the greatest success, but this game is a must-win…

Samuels: Yes it is, and it’s not an easy place to play. Southeast Missouri has a winning record overall, despite being the eighth place seed in the conference. So I think you have to say that they are a better team than their conference record indicates at this point.

Braviere: This team seems like the type of team that you don’t want to catch at this time of the season…

Samuels: You don’t want to catch them on a night when they are shooting well.

Braviere: Especially behind the arc where they shoot the lights out…

Samuels: And they are a deliberate offensive team. They are going to hold the score down. Yes, they are a good defensive team, but they are at the bottom of the league because they are so patient offensively. You don’t get a lot of possessions, so you have to shoot the ball well.

Braviere: They have three guards that are all over the place in Michael Stokes, Amory Sanders and Emmanuel McCuthison. Do you compare them to Tennessee State since they use a lot of guards?

Samuels: Different though unless I’m surprised. They don’t play a four guard set, we’ll at least have a forward match-up. Against Tennessee State, we really had to play four guards because we didn’t have that match-up. Their perimeter kids are very good, especially Amory Sanders. He is very effective off the bench, because he is instant offense.

Braviere: With all of the little guys that will play, will that mean a more accelerated role in the offense for Jesse Mackinson, Jan Thompson and Todd Bergmann?

Samuels: Well, we’d like to get each of those kids a basket or two more than their average. I think that would be a big factor in the game, and it would force SEMO to guard us a little differently.

Braviere: When you guys go on the road, you have a tendency to get lax in the end. Is there one thing you can attribute that to? Or is it just a matter of your team not having the energy of being at home?

Samuels: I’m not sure it’s as simple as that, but maybe it is. You get down to the last three to five minutes of the game and just one play lifts the fans and the bench. Where the visiting team has to continue to make big plays to win games on the road.

Braviere: We talked earlier about SEMO and where they are at in the conference and if things work out, your team may win the championship and play them in the first round of the OVC tournament….

Samuels: They may not be the number eight seed. They are in a pack of teams that could be there. SEMO’S greatest factor is that their last three are at home, even though they have won more on the road this season. But like I indicated earlier, I’m not worried about seedings. But I can tell you that probably no one wants to play any of those teams in that pack.