Oct. 22, 2001

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Southeast Missouri State at Tennessee Tech
Date: Saturday, Oct. 27, 2001
Time: 2:00 p.m.
Location: Tucker Stadium, Cookeville, Tenn. (16,500)
Playing Surface: Artificial
Affiliations: Ohio Valley Conference
Series: Tennessee Tech leads 6-4
Last Meeting: Tennessee Tech won 31-6 at Cookeville
2001 Records: Southeast Missouri 3-5, 1-3 OVC, Tennessee Tech 3-3, 1-2 OVC
The Coaches: Tim Billings is 6-13 in his 2nd season at Southeast Missouri
Mike Hennigan is 31-29 in his 6th season at Tennessee Tech
Radio: Southeast Radio Network anchored by K-103 FM in Cape Girardeau. Other network stations include KSIM in Sikeston and KWOC in Poplar Bluff. Erik Sean will do play-by-play with Ron Hines as the color analyst.
Internet: Southeast Radio Network broadcast can be heard over the internet at www.GoSoutheast.com .

Southeast Schedule/Results
Sept. 1 - E. Mich. 16, SE 12
Sept. 8 - SE 24, SIU 5
Sept. 15 -SW Mo. 31, SE 28
Sept. 22 - SE 38, Ill. St. 33
Sept. 29 Tenn. St. 20, SE 14
Oct. 6 SE 45, UTM 30
Oct. 13 Eastern Ill. 12, SE 0
Oct. 10 Murray 45, SE 35
Oct. 27 at Tenn. Tech, 2:00
Nov. 3 Eastern Ky., 6:00
Nov. 10 Quincy, 6:00

This Week in the OVC
Murray State @ Minnesota
Tenn. State @ Eastern Ill.
Tenn.-Martin @ Samford

THE TEAMS: Southeast is 3-5 overall and 1-3 in the OVC after losing to Murray State 45-35 Saturday. The Indians' OVC win is over Tennessee-Martin while the losses are to Tennessee State, Eastern Illinois and Murray State.

Tennessee Tech is 3-3 overall and 1-2 in the OVC. The Golden Eagles have an OVC win over Murray State with losses to Eastern Illinois and Eastern Kentucky.

THE COACHES: Tim Billings, a former assistant at Marshall, Missouri and Oklahoma, is 6-13 n his second season at Southeast Missouri. He is 0-1 vs. Tech.

Mike Hennigan is 31-29 in his sixth season at Tennessee Tech. He is 4-1 vs. Southeast.

THE SERIES: Tennessee Tech leads the series 6-4 and has won two straight. The last Southeast win was 29-24 at Tech in 1998.

LAST SEASON: Tennessee Tech led only 14-6 going in he fourth quarter but scored the final 17 points of the game for a 31-6 victory. Bobby Brune led Southeast in passing and rushing. He was 23-49 passing for 218 yards and also rushed 14 times for 41 yards.

LAST WEEK: Southeast dropped a 45-35 homecoming decision to Murray State while Tennessee Tech was beaten 34-10 by Eastern Kentucky.

NEW PASSING RECORDS: Southeast established three new passing records in the 45-35 loss to Murray State. The new team records include most passing attempts in a game, 56, and most completions in a game, 32.

Redshirt freshman quarterback Jeromy McDowell established a new Southeast freshman passing record.

McDowell has 1,548 yards passing after just eight games as to break the record of 1,273 yards by Lance Brune in 1970.

The season passing record at Southeast is 2,580 yards by Jason Liley in 1990.

McDowell had a sensational second half against SIU and an equally sensational first half against Southwest Missouri. In the second half against SIU, he completed 14-23 passes for 317 yards and three TD's and in the first half of the SMS game he completed 16-22 passes for 257 yards and three TD's. That gave him consecutive half totals of 30-45 completions for 567 yards and six touchdowns

COOPER LEADS OVC: Curtis Cooper continues to be a very big offensive weapon for Southeast. He leads the OVC and ranks fifth nationally in all-purpose running with 203.8 yards per game. He is third in OVC rushing with 117.3 yards per game that ranks him 19th nationally.

For the second time this season, Cooper was the OVC Offensive Player of the Week after rushing for a career high 216 yards against Tennessee-Martin on Oct. 6. It was the best rushing performance by Indian running back since Kelvin "Earthquake" Anderson rushed for 222 yards against Murray State on Sept. 3, 1992

Cooper had 245 all-purpose yards against Illinois State and 250 all-purpose yards against Tennessee State, and2 all-purpose yards against Tennessee-Martin giving him a three-game total of 787 all-purpose yards.

SOUTHEAST SECOND IN THE OVC IN PASSING AND TOTAL OFFENSE: Southeast ranks second in the OVC in passing offense with 259.5 yards per game and in total offense with 391.3 yards per game.

SOUTHEAST IN NCAA STATS: The Indians rank 17th nationally in passing offense and rank 32nd nationally in total offense.

PONDER, SANDERS LEAD OVC: Southeast junior college transfers Willie Ponder and Adrian Sanders rank at or near the top of every OVC receiving category.

In receptions per game, Ponder ranks first with 6.5 catches per game while Sanders is third with 4.8 catches per game. Cooper is fourth with 4.7 catches per game.

In receiving yards per game, Ponder is first with 104.4 while Sanders is fourth with 71.3 and in total receiving yards, Ponder is first with 835 and Sanders is second with 499.

Nationally, Ponder ranks 12th in receiving yards per game and 13th in receptions per game. He also ranks 29th nationally in all-purpose running with 140.0 yards per game and ranks 56th nationally in scoring with 6.75 points per game.

PONDER CLOSES ON RECORDS: Ponder has already tied the school record for touchdowns in a game with three against Southwest Missouri. He needs 21 catches, 272 yards and two touchdowns to hold each single season record outright.

ANDERSON TOPS OVC TACKLES: Junior safety Prince Anderson, who had 14 tackles against Eastern Illinois, leads the OVC and ranks fifth nationally in tackles with an average of 12.4 tackles per game. Ricky Farmer of Southeast is second in the OVC and 14th nationally with 10.4 tackles per game.

BRUNE MOVES UP CHARTS: Senior Bobby Brune is the backup quarterback. Brune is 43-75 this season for 423 yards. He has 3,838 yards passing in his fourth season at Southeast. Brune needs 98 yards passing to move into 5th place on the all-time passing list and 272 yards to surpass his father Greg on the all-time passing list at Southeast. Greg Brune passed for 4,109 yards from 1967 to 1967.

CAREER PASSING LEADERS:
1. 6,179 Jason Liley (1989-92)
2 5,853 Jeff Brown (1984-87)
3 4,808 Lance Brune (1970-73)
4. 4,109 Greg Brune (1965-67)
5. 3,935 Jim Eustice (1988-89)
6. 3,838 Bob Brune (1998-01)

FRESHMAN KICKERS: Southeast kicking duties are being handled by a pair of true freshmen. Derek Kutz is kicking PAT's and field goals while Brian Emmendorfer kicks off.

Kutz, who is 5-6 in field goals and 21-23 in extra points, ranks fourth in the OVC with an average of 0.83 field goals per game.

WEST CAREER ENDS: Senior quarterback Rashad West underwent knee surgery on Friday, Oct. 12, ending his senior season.

West, who injured the knee in a pick-up basketball game this summer, played in only one game this season, completing 4-6 passes for 27 yards and one touchdown at Tennessee State.

For his Southeast career West 150-269 for 1,955 yards and 8 touchdowns. He rushed the ball 155 times for 681 yards and 12 touchdowns.

TANNER LEAVES TEAM: Freshman defensive back Bruce Tanner has left the Southeast football team for personal reasons. He played in six of this season with 31 tackles including one tackle for a loss of four yards. He started the Oct. 13 game at Eastern Illinois.

Tanner has indicated he will transfer to another school at the end of the first semester.

INJURIES: Linebacker John Paul Usrey (concussion) is questionable for the Tennessee Tech game.

OVC HONORS:
9-1 - Corey Mathis, Def. Player of Week
9-8 - Jeromy McDowell, Newcomer of Week
9-8 - Kyle East, Special Teams Player of Week
9-22 - Curtis Cooper, Off. Player of the Week
10-6 - Curtis Cooper, Off. Player of the Week

YOUNG SQUAD: The current Indian squad has 47 freshman and sophomores on the 76 man squad. There are 37 freshmen including redshirt freshmen and 9 sophomores. There are 19 juniors and only 11 seniors.

NEXT WEEK: Southeast Missouri will be back at Houck Stadium to host Eastern Kentucky in a 6 p.m. OVC game.

DEPTH CHART: See PDF file at top of page.