IU men’s basketball has never lost to an Ohio Valley conference team.
That remained the case Sunday as IU beat Southeast Missouri State, 83-55.
The Hoosiers’ defense was beyond stifling against the Redhawks and kept the visitors to 31-percent shooting.
The Redhawks went just 1-of-14 in the first eight minutes of play, while everything clicked for the Hoosiers and the home quad jumped out to a 16-point lead early in the first half.
However, Southeast Missouri was able to mount a comeback and close the deficit to five at one point in the first half.
“We had a great start to the game, a fantastic start, and then we needed to get our second wind back, ” IU Coach Tom Crean said.
Junior guard Robert Johnson paced the Hoosiers’ attack and helped IU get off to a hot start. Johnson had a team-high 17 points, but his role went far beyond scoring.
“He’s very important from a leader-player standpoint” freshman forward De’ron Davis said. “He controls the tempo on the floor, and he controls everybody pretty much. As a team, we’re working on our communication, but Rob really controls the tempo.”
Communication was an issue for IU in its lone loss of the season against Fort Wayne; however, those problems seem to have been rectified.
The improved communication helped IU’s defense be a dominant force Sunday.
“I think it was just the connectivity of ourselves on the defense,” Johnson said. “The guys are really talking and active, especially in that one stretch in the first half. I think we set the tone early how we wanted to handle certain guys and take away tendencies.”
The only negative aspect for the Hoosiers was IU’s turnover problem, which has plagued the team all season and was used by Southeast Missouri to mount its only comeback attempt.
However, IU responded with an eight-nothing run, which gave the team more breathing room heading into halftime.
IU had 18 turnovers against Southeast Missouri, and Crean said he knows they have to clean those up.
“We have to commit less of them,” Crean said. “We’ve got to do a better job with the ball.”
IU started the second half on a 10-to-1 run, sparked by freshman guard Curtis Jones.
He had five points in that stretch and helped the Hoosiers take firm control of the game.
Crean praised IU’s defensive effort in the second half, which possibly was even more effective than it was in the first 20 minutes and forced the Redhawks to go on another long drought of nearly eight minutes without scoring.
IU cruised in the second half and never got a real threat from the Redhawks.
The victory marked the end of a difficult four games in eight days for the Hoosiers.
“I think it was pretty tough,” Johnson said. “I’m proud of the way the guys fought and found the energy to be locked into things like shootaround to film. I think it’s a really big jump for our young guys as far as how you have to prepare every game. I think overall it was a good week.”
