The Eastern men’s basketball team let early leads in both halves slip away against Southeast Missouri State Tuesday night in Lantz Arena and lost 88-79.

Eastern (9-13, 4-7 Ohio Valley Conference) led SEMO (12-10, 7-4) by as many as seven points in both halves before the Redhawks’ hot shooting put them in control.

“We were able to get that spurt, but we’re not able to maintain it,” Eastern head coach Rick Samuels said.

SEMO senior forwards Dainmon Gonner and Reggie Golson both recorded double-doubles in the Redhawks’ win. Gonner, the OVC’s scoring leader, had a team-high 23 points to go along with 10 rebounds. Golson, the conference’s leading rebounder, finished with 11 points and a game-high 13 boards.

Junior guard Josh Gomes led four Panthers in double figures, scoring a game-high 28 points. Freshman guard Bobby Catchings had 16 points, senior guard Emanuel Dildy had 15 points and senior forward Aaron Patterson dropped 11 points in the losing effort.

The Panthers raced to a six-point lead to start the second half and led by as many as seven before SEMO rallied.

Samuels said his team seemed sluggish.

“We looked tired,” Samuels said. “We just didn’t have an energy level that I’d anticipate we need at the end of the game like this.”

Eastern held on to a slim lead until just over eight and a half minutes to play when SEMO sophomore guard Terrick Willoughby scored on a put-back and was fouled. The Redhawks took their first lead of the second half at 64-62 after Willoughby made his free-throw to complete the three-point play.

Later a 7-0 run put the Redhawks up 73-66. The Panthers cut the lead to four after a hoop from Gomes, but Eastern wouldn’t get any closer.

“We never got that important stop,” Gomes said.

Both teams came out shooting well with SEMO hitting 50 percent of their field goals and Eastern draining 53.6 percent of their shots. However, the difference came from beyond the three-point arc where the Redhawks connected on 7-of-13 long-range attempts. The Panthers hit 2-of-4 from three.

The Panthers jumped out to an early lead, behind four straight points from senior forward Aaron Patterson. Eastern led by as many as seven, when Gomes’ 18-foot jumper made the score 19-12. Gomes led all scorers with 12 first-half points.

But the Redhawks fired back, going on 10-2 run to take a 22-21 lead. Eastern quickly tied when Patterson made the second of two free throws and tied again at 24.

But, SEMO put together another run, this one 8-2, giving them 32-26 lead. The Panthers slowly chipped away at the lead, tying the score at 35 with just under two minutes in the half.

SEMO took another small lead when Golson split a pair of free-throws with just over 25 seconds left to make it 39-37. But the Panthers responded and tied things at 39, when Dildy found a wide-open Gomes in the corner for a long two-pointer just as time expired.

Catchings said Eastern needs to sustain their efforts for an entire game.

“Basketball is a game of runs,” he said. “We need to learn how to put teams away.”

The Panthers won’t have much time to think about the loss, as they prepare to take on Tennessee State (11-13, 6-4) at 7:35 p.m. Thursday at Lantz Arena.