SEMO MBB’s offense is too strong as the Redhawks lead Kansas…

“My guys kept finding me,” said Washington Jr. “I was in the right place at the right time. I just took the candid shots. I have to give my guys a lot of credit.”

SEMO’s strong defensive performance was highlighted by a season-high 39 rebounds, which marked the first time this season that Korn’s team outrebounded a Division I opponent (39-33).

“Our guys made a conscious effort to defend with energy and connection,” Korn said. “We just threw the basketball back, which I think really demoralized them early in the first half. They were frustrated because they couldn’t get anywhere they wanted to go, but that was because we were in the right place.”

Big picture

A week off from a two-game stretch in Conway, Arkansas, the Redhawks showed no signs of regressing against a Kansas City team that fell 74-44 to SEMO last season.

After shooting a season-low 34.9% (22 of 63) from the field against UNC Asheville, SEMO responded by hitting 45% of its shots against the Summit League’s top-rated defense on Saturday and passing quickly and playing gases throughout the night. In fact, the Redhawks had one of their most efficient nights of the season, despite second-leading scorer BJ Ward shooting 0 of 9 from the field.

Aside from the record loss, this team’s recent rise and ability to turn up the intensity will be of great benefit moving forward, especially as conference play approaches.

“Honestly, outside of Bradley, that’s where we are,” Terry said. “For example, against Vandy, we played phenomenal in the first three quarters of that game. So we knew it was always there. It was simply played for the entire 40 minutes, and coach Korn said a lot about it. And today we showed that we can do that.”

What’s next?

SEMO will return to the court on Thursday, December 5th when Korn’s team travels to Nashville, Tennessee to face Lipscomb at 11 a.m

“I watched and watched a lot of Coach (Nick) Saban’s stuff,” Korn said. “He said he was tougher on his boys after they won, just to combat the poison. We have tomorrow off – they deserve this day off – and then we’ll just go back to basics. There’s a saying in our program: ‘Dominate Simple.’ I thought tonight we just dominated on both sides of the ball. So we just have to just dominate again in training on Monday.”