GAME NOTES: The Indiana State Sycamores shoot for a rare road win tonight as they drop in on the Southern Illinois Salukis in Missouri Valley Conference action at SIU Arena in Carbondale. The Sycamores have won just once in the last six games, yet gave 16th-ranked Drake a run for its money on Saturday in an 83-77 decision. The setback was the third in a row for the squad and dropped them to 5-6 in MVC action. Meanwhile, the Salukis also came up on the losing end of their conference game over the weekend as well, bowing to Northern Iowa at the McLeod Center by a final of 68-63. The decision snapped a brief two-game win streak for the squad. The first meeting of the season between these two teams went to double overtime before Indiana State slipped by with the 64-62 triumph at home back on January 12. As a result of that decision, the Sycamores cut slightly into the all-time series, which now stands at 74-36 in favor of Southern Illinois.

Indiana State shot an impressive 55.6 percent from the field on Saturday, but the squad was outscored at the free-throw line, 23-11, by nationally-ranked Drake in the six-point decision at the Hulman Center. Except for Jay Tunnell who tallied just two points in 22 minutes, every starter for the Sycamores ended up in double figures, beginning with Gabe Moore and his 19 points, to go along with seven assists before fouling out. Todd McCoy stepped in with 13 points, while Harry Marshall and Marico Stinson both posted 12 points in the setback. On a team that is scoring just 63.2 ppg on 41.5 percent shooting from the floor, Stinson leads Indiana State with his 12.9 ppg, but is converting under 40 percent from the field after 21 games. Moore (10.5 ppg) has more than twice as many assists (98) as any one else and is also first on the unit with 47 steals, showing his value at both ends of the floor.

Southern Illinois allowed the Panthers to score the first points of the game over the weekend, found itself trailing 9-2 less than four minutes in and was never able to recover. Nevertheless, Randal Falker still finished with 21 points and eight rebounds, both of which led the squad, while Joshua Bone and Matt Shaw tacked on 13 and 12 points, respectively, although they combined to shoot only 8-of-26 from the field in the process. The Salukis have one of the top scoring defenses in the conference, giving up only 59.8 ppg, but the squad doesn't give itself much space by scoring a mere 62 ppg over the course of 22 outings. Falker is first in both scoring (12.5 ppg) and rebounding (6.6 rpg) and Shaw is second in both categories (12.3 ppg, 6.5 rpg).

No longer the threatening power that it has been in previous years, Southern Illinois has come back to the rest of the pack, while the Sycamores have gained a bit of confidence over previous years. However, with the Salukis playing at home, it would be hard to go against them in this case, despite how far they've fallen.