Making plans to tear down the goal posts at O’Brien Stadium? Not so fast rowdy Panther fan. Head coach Bob Spoo has words of caution for you.

“It’s not over yet,” Spoo said Wednesday. “We can’t get lulled into complacency.”

With a bye week this weekend and the Panthers’ next three opponents carrying a 5-15 record, Spoo is also hoping his players won’t be lulled to sleep.

“That scares me more than our opponent,” Spoo said. “It’s their thought process. I’d rather they respect the other team than feel like they’ve arrived. I hope we’ve got a mature enough group so they understand what’s happening and what could happen.”

Spoo has some legitimate concerns about his team one week before it rolls into Nashville to play Tennessee State (1-6, 0-1 in the Ohio Valley Conference). The Tigers play host to Tennessee-Martin Saturday.

Murray State (2-4, 1-1), whom Eastern will play Nov. 26, hasn’t been blown out of its losses except the season-opening 52-6 loss at Memphis.

The Skyhawks (Eastern’s Nov. 9 opponent at O’Brien Stadium) will have big problems against the Panther offense.

Outside of a Week 1 one-point win at home against Southwest Missouri Baptist and a 42-14 win over Division II Kentucky Wesleyan, Tennessee-Martin lost its games by an average of 30 points.

Tennessee State also has a unique way of implementing its special teams unit. On fourth down, the Tigers will often stay in a huddle on the sidelines until the last few seconds are left on the play clock. It keeps opponents’ defenses on the field and punt coverage on the offensive.

Eastern was interested in recruiting Tigers’ quarterback, sophomore Dwayne Buchanan. The St. Louis native has completed 52.9 percent of his 68 passes with four touchdowns and three interceptions.

“They’ve got some talented young players,” Spoo said. “We’ve got to keep them under wraps. I think we’ve gotten much better on defense lately.”

Eastern stepped up on D’ when it needed to last weekend against SEMO. The Indians converted on only three of 11 third downs.

But there’s room for improvement, Spoo said that’s always the case.

“We’re not perfect by any way,” Spoo said. “We could pick everything we do up a notch. Our defense has to get better. We’ve got to stop the pass a bit better. We’ve got to stop the run and we’ve got to stop dropping passes. There are just a lot of the little things that we can continue to improve upon.”