Men's Basketball hosts Loyola on Senior Night

Saturday, February 25

Carbondale, Ill.

7:00 PM

Southern Illinois University

Loyola

Photo by: Tom Weber

02/24/2017 | 3:03:00 | Men's Basketball

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By: By Tom Weber, SIUSalukis.com

Southern Illinois (15-15, 8-9) hosts Loyola (18-12, 8-9) on Saturday night at 7 p.m. in the regular-season finale for both clubs. Prior to the game, the Salukis will honor seniors Sean O'Brien, Mike Rodriguez and Leo Vincent, who will play the final home game of their career. The trio has combined to score 2,362 points, grab 1,028 rebounds and dish out 513 assists in their Saluki careers.

If SIU wins the game, it will secure the No. 4 seed at next week's conference tournament and play a rematch with No. 5 Loyola. If SIU loses, it will be the No. 5 seed and play either Loyola or Northern Iowa.

Head coach Barry Hinson met with the media prior to Friday's practice.

Do you remember the first time you saw these three seniors?
I remember Tom Hankins (former assistant coach) said 'Coach, I found a player in Sean O'Brien.' He said, he's a little unusual, he can play a little bit of every spot. I went and watched him play, and I said, boy, you're right. Come to look at it five years from there, the guy has played every position on the floor for us. It's really been a fun process to watch him mature not only as a player but as a young man. I can't remember a time when I've watched a young man in a four-year period really mature, not only as a player, but off the floor and as a leader, and just as a personality, has really been impressive.

I don't mind telling you, Senior Night is an emotional night for me. I look back at everything, the process of recruiting, I look back at the first time I saw these guys, the first time I met with them or had a conversation with their parents or relatives. Leo never has a bad day. Everything is always it's going to be ok. I'm literally going to miss Michael's smile. He's never in a bad mood. He has an unbelievable passion for the game and just wants to win. Saturday is mixed emotions. They've meant a lot to this program. We had to have a point guard two years ago. We had to. And we had to have somebody who could come in and make shots from the perimeter. That's what happened with Michael and Leo. And with the absence of Anthony (Beane), we had to have somebody take over that role of leadership, and Sean O'Brien did. They're three just really perfect pieces of the puzzle for this basketball team.

How do you celebrate their careers and also focus on the task at hand against Loyola?
Senior Night is a tricky night. There's a lot of pomp and circumstance and you have to differentiate between the two. I think what drives our guys and is really exciting for our guys, we have a chance to finish in third place in this league, and we're one of the top conferences in college basketball. So does the other team we're playing, so this is a playoff game. Sean O'Brien started out in 10th and worked his way up to fourth and now has a chance to work his way up to third. What happens is, those sophomore, juniors and freshmen see, ok, now let's climb one more step and let's get to second, let's get to first, let's win the league. That's the whole process. These guys laid the groundwork for that.

You seem to be playing better defensively. Have you had practices where everybody has clicked offensively?
I think that day is coming. What a better time than to do it in postseason. I know I keep saying, but I believe it in my heart, I know these guys can make shots. I know it. I'm not going to stop. If it never comes to avail, I'm not stopping. I think this is the best shooting team we've had since I've been here, and we just haven't shown it statistically.

How do you find three new guys that fit the same molds of the three seniors?
Everybody starts looking to next season before this season is over, and it's just general nature, we all do that. We have to replace Mike Rodriguez with a point guard we feel very comfortable with. We're going to replace him with a guy that I think can really play point guard, and that's 6-foot-4 Marcus Bartley. I think we have a really good fit with Aaron Cook and he's going to be a really special player. It gives us an opportunity to have two really good players on the floor. Unexpectedly, we have to replace Leo with a shooter. We have a guy, I don't know if you've heard of him, named Tyler Smithpeters with a medical redshirt. So we've done those two. There's no Sean O'Briens out there. If you think we're going to find one and just pick one out, we're not. If there were a Sean O'Brien out there right now, we wouldn't be able to touch him. Collectively, we have to take care of what Sean O'Brien did for us, much like we did this year when we collectively had to take care of the loss of Anthony (Beane). I'm very encouraged about what we have sitting out, whom we're recruiting for pieces of the puzzle.

How is Thik Bol doing? You said last week he was kind of hurt.
I think Thik Bol is playing at the highest level he's played at all year. A lot of that has to do with we've taken a completely different approach with him in practice. Thik's got a little bit of what Sean O'Brien's got. He's got some knee issues. We've really slacked off of him with our practices times really decreased for him, so he's got unbelievable fresh legs. Thik's had two big-time moves. At Indiana State a right-handed jump hook where he beat a guy off the floor, and at Illinois State he went off the top of the key with a left-handed move. His shot blocking right now is unbelievable. He's timing it, he's staying down, he's not jumping in the air on shot fakes. I'm really impressed with Thik right now.

How do you get the tempo in your favor against Loyola?
They want to run as fast as they can, they want to shoot the ball from the three and the perimeter. If you put this game on paper, we look like we can't even be in the game with them. Every statistical category, with the exception of rebounding, they're better than us. Every one of them. The game for us will be determined on the defensive end. We have to do a great job on (Aundre) Jackson and we have to find four capable 3-point shooters at any time. The last time they were in this building they beat us by 15 points.

Sean is your only fourth-year player. How do you get more of those on a more consistent basis?
We wouldn't be in the junior college recruiting we are, had we not had the mass exodus of the five guys. The starting point guard at UAB was here. The starting four-man at Nevada was here. The second-leading scorer at Northern Colorado was here. The ninth-leading rebounder in the Southeast Conference was here. All those are four-year players. Say what you want, but I think we've done an unbelievable job recruiting-wise in finding the guys. We struggled with those four guys staying. We can hash that out any way you want. We can point fingers, but the bottom line is, what did you do to get those guys here? We did. Think about this basketball team. Now I'll say this, we wouldn't have had a Mike Rodriguez, probably wouldn't have had a Thik Bol, had some of those guys stayed. I thought last year was incredible after the mass exodus. I think we're still seeing repercussions from that. I've never faltered from saying this — I think the key to this league is fourth and fifth-year guys. I give my staff credit. If we sign four guys this year, or three guys, 50 percent or more are going to be high school or four-year players. We're trying to go that route as much as possible.

Retention-wise, is there something you do to try to build a stronger relationship, or do you feel like you did what you could?
Let's go back to the three guys. How about we just cover those three individually? One guy's dad wanted him to be a guard, and he was convinced he was going to be a guard, and he's playing the four. How do you combat that? One guy tells you he's going to come back, gives his word he's coming back. One guy didn't want to redshirt. One guy point blank, he just wanted to leave. He didn't like it here. He wanted to get out of Southern Illinois.

The retention rate — if you can figure that out for me right now — we need to write a book together. Because it is this day and age. It's the millennial, the grass is always greener somewhere else. It's easier somewhere else. I don't want to take criticism. I don't want to take any type of critique. Have I changed? Yeah, I've changed a lot. Even after the mass exodus, I felt like I changed some, but I'm not going to change in the areas I think are important — fundamentals, character, trying to get a guy to play to the best of his ability. My favorite line has always been this, and I believe this — when it becomes more important to me than it is to you, then it's time for you to move on. I've given that speech about five or six times since I've been here. I'm going to stay with that until the day I die. You know what, it may end up costing me my job. But I'll know this, when I wake up every day, someone's going to fault me for trying to get the best out of an individual.

I don't belittle our players. I love 'em. It's tough love. I tell them that in the recruiting process. I'm getting ready to meet with a recruit and his parents this weekend and I'm going to tell them — do not come here unless you want your son to be coached to the highest level of possibility. Do not come here unless you want your son to come here and go to class every day. When he doesn't, or when he misses study hall, or when he messes up, there will be punishment. Don't come here, and sometimes they don't, that's probably the best thing they don't. I really like our plan. I like my staff and what we've done. I think we're headed in the right direction. I don't think — I know we are — as evident by what's going on with our team.