SIU men’s basketball head coach Scott Nagy didn’t mince words in his postgame press conference. 

“For us, it still wasn’t pretty. But when plays needed to be made, I thought our guys did that,” Nagy said.

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The Salukis narrowly pulled out a 73-70 win over the Southern Indiana Screaming  Eagles in the Banterra Center to move to 3-0 at home.

The game was tight from wire-to-wire, with the largest lead either team had being only an eight-point advantage held by the Dawgs at numerous times through the game.

It came down to clutch play at the end, engineered by Davion Sykes’ three-pointer with four minutes left to put the Dawgs up by eight with four minutes left to play followed by Kennard Davis Jr. knocking down a jumper with 20 seconds left to put the Dawgs up by a more comfortable four points.

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Jarrett Hensley, who finished the game with his second consecutive double-double, iced it for the Salukis by making a free throw with three seconds left to play and putting SIU up by three.

“I thought our guys in the last four minutes executed very well, Nagy said.   

While SIU shot 59% from the floor in the first half, they found themselves up by only three. This all changed after half, when the Salukis were able to turn up the defensive intensity.

“We played much better defense in the second half, and because of that we really hurt them on the glass,” Nagy said. “That has to be a formula for us, the defense and the rebounding.”

The play of the big men, especially Antwaun Massey, also made for some tough sledding for Southern Indiana. Massey, who finished with 10 points and eight rebounds, was able to implement some physical play against the Screaming Eagles’ Stephen Olowoniyi, who finished with 24 points but was in foul trouble for much of the second half.

“Antwaun going after (Olowoniyi) early in the second half, getting him in foul trouble was big for us,” Nagy said.

Nagy and his staff also made some critical offensive adjustments that seemed to have helped simplify, and in turn open up, his offense.

“In the motion, you have so many options that sometimes it freezes you. So now, we’re just giving them a few options, you make these decisions and you play off them,” Nagy said. “It was a bit cumbersome today… but I think it’s gonna help us a lot.”

Massey, whose 10 points were the most he has scored all season, was one of the main benefactors of these changes. Hensley continued his uptick in scoring as well putting in 16 points, and Ali Dibba paced the team with 19.

There’s still one more chance that Nagy feels he needs to make in order to help his team play more freely.

“I need to get myself relaxed so our players are relaxed and they’ll start to make some of those shots,” Nagy said. 

The Salukis (4-6, 0-1) won’t play again until 4:00 p.m. on Dec. 14, when they’ll be on the road to take on the Austin Peay Governors. 

Sports consultant Ryan Grieser can be reached at [email protected]. To stay up to date on all your southern Illinois news, be sure to follow The Daily Egyptian on Facebook and on X @dailyegyptian.

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