Indians belatedly pick up first victory of season

A victory at last -- although it definitely didn't come easily.

Southeast Missouri State University's Indians, who had lost their first five games of the season, finally broke into the win column Saturday night as they fought off Division II North Alabama 75-68 in front of 4,949 fans at the Show Me Center.

"It feels good to finally win," said Southeast coach Gary Garner, whose squad needed a late 10-0 burst to squeak past a former Division II powerhouse that has fallen on hard times this year and is just 2-6.

But for the Indians, it didn't matter who they had just beaten. They were simply glad to get a triumph under any circumstances.

"We needed a win so badly, it didn't matter who it was against, Duke or whoever," said Garner. "We just needed to win. Now we'll come back to practice with an extra bounce in our step, the players and the coaches."

The Indians, who led by just a point with under five minutes remaining and by only three points with less than four minutes left, saw three players score in double figures.

Tim Scheer, a junior forward, came off the bench to score a career-high 23 points and he also pulled down eight rebounds.

"It feels great to get the monkey off our back," said Scheer.

Drew DeMond scored 15 points and had seven rebounds while Demetrius King added 14 points as he hit four of seven 3-pointers. King also had four assists. Brett Hale scored nine points and dished out six assists.

"It doesn't matter who it was against, we needed a 'W'," DeMond said. "Hopefully we can build on this."

North Alabama got 18 points and eight rebounds from Ricky Duff. Phillip Perre and Darren Price both added 10 points.

"I thought they looked a lot better than 2-6," said Garner of the Lions. "The Duff kid is a really good player."

A back-and-forth first half that featured several lead changes ended with Southeast ahead 33-31. The Indians' biggest opening-half advantage was seven points at 32-25 before the Lions, whose biggest lead was four points at 19-15, made a late surge.

Things remained tight for most of the final half. Southeast went up 35-31 but North Alabama pulled into a 35-35 tie. The Indians surged ahead 40-35 but the Lions closed to within 44-42.

The Indians appeared to take semi-control when they used a 7-0 run -- five of the points came from Daniel Weaver -- to open up a 51-42 lead with just under nine minutes remaining.

But the Lions would simply not go away. They scored six straight points to pull within 51-48 and closed the gap to 58-57 with under five minutes to go.

That's when the Indians hit the Lions with a 10-0 spurt to finally put the visitors away. Scheer's dunk at the 4:27 mark made it 60-57 and two Scheer free throws with 3:51 left made it 62-57. A DeMond block led to his own slam for a 64-57 lead and the margin later grew to 68-57 with less than three minutes remaining.

"It was two points, but I guess it got the crowd into it and maybe it hurts the other team's feelings," said a smiling Scheer of his slam that ignited the Indians' key closing burst.

To the Lions' credit, they kept fighting and managed to get within 73-68 in the final seconds before a King bucket sealed things.

The Indians shot 49 percent from the field, including nearly 58 percent in the second half as they connected on 15 of 26 attempts. For the game, Southeast was 26 of 53 compared to 41 percent for the Lions on 25 of 61.