When Eastern steps onto the court against Western Illinois tonight, senior guard Josh Gomes is hoping that the game will seem to last longer than the regular season opener against Xavier.

“I don’t know what happened,” he said.

Eastern head coach Mike Miller and his team both were probably wishing the result didn’t happen as the Musketeers blew past the Panthers 80-35. Three days later Eastern dropped a 69-45 contest to St. Louis.

“That (Xavier game) just went by us,” Gomes said. “To me, the game seemed like a half an hour and we were right back on the road.”

Eastern (0-2) shot a school-record low 18 percent in the loss, converting 9 of 49 field goal attempts.

“Shots we needed to make we didn’t make,” said Miller, who made his head-coaching debut two Saturdays ago. “Part of it was we were overmatched. I don’t think on that night we were going to beat them, but we could have played better than what we did.”

Miller also said that the missed shots could also be attributed to the team rushing the offense and pressing to make up for the large deficit.

Xavier was led by sophomore forward Brian Thornton, who scored a game-high 20 points in only 24 minutes of action. The 6-foot-9 sophomore made all eight of his field goal attempts while also pulling down nine rebounds.

The Musketeers used their size advantage, totaling more points in the paint (36) than Eastern’s overall score.

The Panthers faced a 37-18 deficit at halftime and any hopes of a comeback were diminished right after the break. Xavier’s lead swelled to 49-20 five minutes into the second half and led by as much as 46 late in the second half.

Gomes was the only Eastern player in double figures, with 11 points, but shot three of 13.

The road struggles continued for the Panthers against St. Louis.

Playing in St. Charles, Mo., instead of St. Louis because of a scheduling conflict that the Billikens had with the National Hockey League’s St. Louis Blues.

Eastern jumped out to an early lead, only to see it disappear.

Leading 17-10 behind the strong play of freshman guard Mike Robinson, SLU went on a 20-2 run in the last seven minutes to close out the first half.

“What really hurt us was when Mike Robinson picked up his third foul and had to go out,” Miller said. Robinson led Eastern with 16 points on four of six shooting from beyond the arc.

Eastern’s shooting percentage was a little higher against SLU as they shot 35 percent. But Miller said the team needs to play better regardless of whether they shoot poorly.

“You’re going to have segments where you don’t make shots or it’s hard to score, but then you need to get fouled, get a put back,” he said. “You have to find another way to score and keep going and we just weren’t able to do that.”

One area that Eastern struggled with was the ability to get to the foul line. Sophomore center George Tandy, who Miller said was more aggressive against SLU compared to his outing against Xavier, made all four of the Panthers free throw attempts.

Miller altered his starting lineup from Xavier by inserting sophomore center Wes Wilkin in place of sophomore forward Jake Byrne.

Sophomore forward Bobby Catchings, who started against the Musketeers, came off the bench against the Billikens in favor of senior guard Jake Sinclair.

“We could change game-to-game right now,” said Miller about the starting five. “We’re trying to get off to the best start and part of that is match-ups. We’re trying to figure out what’s the best match-up and how we can play most efficiently.”

The transition from long-time head coach Rick Samuels’ system to Miller’s has been a work in progress, Gomes said.

“You don’t want to mess up, you don’t want to do the wrong thing, and you can’t play like that,” he said. “You just have to go out there and play.”

The combined 80 points that the Panthers have tallied in the first two games might be matched in tonight’s game against the Leathernecks.

Western plays an up-tempo game, said Miller, and could use as many as 12 players in the game.

“What it does is it forces players to make plays,” said Miller about Western’s fast-paced style of play. “You can’t really run set plays against that. The guys are just going to have to react with instincts, play with spacing and have better ball movement.”

Western (1-2) is coming off a loss to nationally ranked Indiana, 102-79 last Saturday. The Leathernecks feature two starters, senior forward Keith Oguns and sophomore guard David Jackson, averaging double figures. Oguns comes into the game averaging 18 points per game, while Jackson isn’t far behind at 17 ppg.

Gomes knows the importance of this game and Saturday’s home opener against Indiana State before venturing into Ohio Valley Conference play.

“If we can be 2-2 right before conference starts, we’ll be right where we want to be.”