Southern Miss hoops making progress

An overall record of 9-10 doesn’t sound great, but when you consider those nine wins are the same as the Southern Miss men’s basketball team had all of last year, the progress is obvious.
For starters, the Golden Eagles are starting to rebuild their home court advantage with a perfect 7-0 record at Reed Green Coliseum. On top of that, the Black and Gold are now two years removed from their second post-season ban and the results are starting to show under Doc Sadler.
USM has never won more than nine games in any of his first three seasons at the helm and the program still has 12 regular season matchups left to do just that. Coach Sadler said, “Being at a lot of places, their season doesn’t start until the NCAA Tournament. Well, the fact of the matter is how you play in our Conference Tournament is going to dictate on what you get to do the rest of the year. So you want to use the preseason to get ready, and I thought we did that.”
USM Guard Cortez Edwards said, “I think the most important thing is to focus on ourselves. If we worry about the other team then we’re going to be even more up and down, so we’ve just got to focus on ourselves and try to get better.”
Southern Miss plays six out of its next nine games at home, starting tomorrow against Rice at 7 p.m.