~ Southeast men's basketball team opens conference play Thursday at the Show Me Center.

Southeast Missouri State men's basketball coach Scott Edgar believes his team is sufficiently battle-tested as it prepares to open Ohio Valley Conference play.

Edgar also knows he and the Redhawks will relish being inside the Show Me Center this week, after they had only two of their first eight games at home.

"After 3,500 bus miles, I will look forward to coaching at home again," Edgar said Monday.

Southeast (4-4) begins OVC play with a pair of home games, Thursday night against Tennessee State (2-4) and Saturday night against Tennessee Tech (2-6).

Tech, among the top teams in the OVC the past several years, has already played one conference game, losing at home 79-76 to defending OVC regular-season champion Austin Peay.

"It's like a marathon. The marathon begins Thursday night," Edgar said of the 20-game OVC schedule. "It's already started in some parts of the conference."

Southeast's pre-conference schedule has featured games at nationally ranked Xavier, and at Bradley and Illinois State of the Missouri Valley Conference.

The Redhawks lost all three of those contests by at least 18 points, but they did post a road win over Louisiana Tech of the Western Athletic Conference.

Southeast also owns a 10-point home victory over Evansville of the MVC -- a team that drubbed the Redhawks by 20 points last year.

"That's what you want," said Edgar of facing a challenging pre-conference schedule in order to get ready for OVC play. "But I believe every team in the OVC should feel a little battle-tested.

"I think the first month for us, like everybody else in our conference, has been extremely challenging."

Said Southeast senior forward Brandon Foust following Saturday's 90-72 loss at Bradley: "We've played some good teams. I think it [the schedule] has helped us a lot."

Edgar's first Southeast squad last season entered OVC play 2-5, including some hideous losses to teams that weren't considered all that imposing (including by 20 points to Evansville, by 27 points to Drake, by 32 points to Centenary and by 19 points at home to IPFW).

Edgar said he believes the Redhawks will enter this year's OVC schedule significantly improved compared to a year ago.

"This team has been much more competitive record wise, and if you want to break down statistics," said Edgar, whose squad went 11-20 overall and a sixth-place 9-11 in the OVC last year. "And in some ways we've played a better schedule."

Southeast senior center Mike Rembert said following Saturday's contest he has no doubt the Redhawks are much better now than they were at the same time last season.

"I think we're head-and-shoulders above where we were last year," Rembert said. "We've learned a lot."

Edgar acknowledges that the Redhawks still have plenty of improving to do, but he considers many teams to be in the same boat this early in the season.

Neither Tennessee State nor Tennessee Tech has beaten a Division I squad so far, but Edgar said he considers them to be "as physically gifted as any teams in the conference."

Edgar knows it would be great to start off OVC play with two home wins, but no matter what happens this week, he said the Redhawks have to remember that there will still be 18 conference games left.

"Obviously you want to hold serve and steal one on the road," Edgar said. "The first win at home would be great to get ... we have to throw everything we can into beating a very talented Tennessee State team.

"Right now it's the most important game on our slate."