Just three nights after knocking off Big 10 Illinois in their first exhibition game of the season, the Eastern men’s basketball team fell into too big of a hole against Southern Indiana and it cost them.

It led to a 95-92 loss Monday night in Lantz Arena.

The hole Eastern dug for itself was not being able to find an answer for Southern Indiana’s three-point attack.

The Screaming Eagles shot 16-of-25 from beyond the arc for a 64 percentage in the game.

“We were good on offense, but we were terrible on defense,” Spoonhour said. “The game of basketball is this way; if you go out and don’t do a couple of major things, couldn’t track a couple rebounds down, we took a couple bad shots on a stretch.”

He said if you do things like that on a significant stretch of time, you are going to lose.

“Those guys are good,” Spoonhour said.

He went on to compare them to what Illinois brought to Lantz Arena.
“They’re going to give you the same thing Brad (Underwood) gave you,” Spoonhour said. “We scheduled this one when we knew we needed a hard game and it was before we even knew we were going to play Illinois. It’s probably a little harder than what we needed.”

The Panthers were able to play two tough teams in their exhibition games and head to Big Ten Nebraska Friday to open their regular season.

And as far as the three pointers go, the Screaming Eagles had open ones all night.

“The guards beat us off the dribble, beat us to the baseline, slung the ball out and we were late to getting there to help and every time they made it,” Spoonhour said. “Every time we broke down, they made them.”

Alex Stein and Nate Hansen were the leaders of the three-point-shot parade hitting 4-of-5 each.

When Eastern got down, they tried to come back with the three ball and its shots just did not fall Monday night.

Eastern attacked the basket in the opening minutes of the game, having 10 of its first 15 points come in the paint. The Panthers tried to come back by making threes as well, but their shots did not fall. They shot 36.8 percent from beyond the arc.

Junior Jajuan Starks and junior D’Angelo Jackson did their best to drive back into the lane and try to start the comeback that way. They were able to get to the line more often, but it was not enough.

Starks led with 23 points and Jackson had 17. Senior Montell Goodwin put together a 17-point night.

The Panthers trailed 45-42 at the end of the first half after a late surge brought them close after they trailed 38-24 with 7:49 left in the first half.

Southern Indiana went on a 15-to-6 run in the first six minutes of the second half. Three of those baskets came from beyond the arc.

The Panthers nearly put together a comeback win, cutting it to four points on three different occasions in the final minute, but when Eastern fouled Southern Indiana, it fouled its best free-throw shooter Stein.

He made key free throws in that stretch and Eastern could not pull it off.

“The fellas learned a whole lot,” Spoonhour said. “We had really good energy, but we didn’t have good energy.”

Sean Hastings can be reached at 581-2812 or smhastings@eiu.edu