By Tom Weber
Saluki Media Services

Have you ever wondered why Saluki senior Jeff Early plays with such a non-stop motor — always hustling and scrapping — as if he has a chip on his shoulder? Turns out he does have an axe or two to grind.

The Virginia native, who spent most of his childhood growing up in Puerto Rico, will never forget the day he was cut from his eighth-grade basketball team. The coach flat-out told him he didn’t have the size or talent to play junior-high hoops.

A devastated Early practiced and trained on his own almost every day, determined to prove the coach wrong. Soon, he realized his coach was correct. He was short and his skills were lacking. That’s when Early decided to try a different approach that would set him apart.

“No matter how well you can shoot or how bad you are at dribbling, if you play as hard as you can and leave everything on the court, anything can happen,” he explained. “I still carry that feeling around of when I got cut and being the only one of my friends not on the basketball team.”

Early’s frenetic, high-energy style was born out of necessity and made its debut at Rockbridge High School, where he blossomed into an All-State basketball player. He was also a football star and would’ve accepted a gridiron scholarship, except for academic deficiencies. Rather than play JUCO football across the country in Kansas, he elected to play basketball for nearby Allegany College and earned All-American status his freshman year. To increase his profile, he transferred to JUCO powerhouse Monroe College, where he subsequently broke both feet in the span of 18 months.

Although he was named an All-American at Monroe in 2011, most Division I coaches shied away from Early because of his injury history and lingering questions about his unorthodox shot. Saluki assistant coach Anthony Stewart loved Early’s dogged style and convinced Southern Illinois head coach Chris Lowery to take a chance on both Early and Monroe teammate T.J. Lindsay.

“Everything happens for a reason, and if I didn’t have academic problems, I would have pursued my football career out of high school, and if I didn’t break both feet, I wouldn’t be at SIU,” Early said. “God sent me on a different path.”

The 6-foot-1 Early was a part-time starter at guard last year for SIU and averaged 8.6 points and 3.8 rebounds — not bad numbers, but modest in comparison to the breakout season he’s experienced for Southern this year. Early is averaging 12.6 points and leads the nation among players 6-foot-1 or shorter with 7.4 rebounds per contest. He’s coming off a monster game against Miami University in which he scored a career-high 31 points and recorded his eighth double-double of the season.

Perhaps the key to his dramatic improvement has been a position switch to what first-year head coach Barry Hinson calls the hybrid forward. Early admits being skeptical at first about the proposed change.

“Coach pulled Josh (Swan) and I to the side one day and said he had a plan for us to be successful this year,” Early recalled. “I’d never heard of the word hybrid, and he told me it was the four. I started thinking, how am I going to play the four?”

The move has paid off for the Salukis and Early, who can use his explosive, energetic style to his advantage against taller, slower four-men. Defensively, he’s worked hard not to be a liability.

“I have my disadvantages on height and weight,” he acknowledged. “With how aggressive I play and with the mentality I play, I think I overcome most of the disadvantages.”

The 24-year-old Early, who is the oldest player in the Missouri Valley Conference, said he’s improved as a team leader this season, as well.

“Coach told me not to be afraid to tell my teammates what’s right and what’s wrong,” he said. “We’re so cool together off the court that sometimes you don’t want to make them mad and mess the friendship up. Somebody might take a bad shot or make a turnover, and before, I wouldn’t say anything or say it under my breath. I started to get to know how each player responds. There’s certain players you can yell at to get them going, and there’s certain players you have to talk to them calmly so they don’t get off their game.”

The Salukis have won four of their last six games, and in the wins over Missouri State and Miami University, it was Early who shook his teammates out of their doldrums for come-from-behind victories.

“I think it’s the drive I have and the love for the game,” he said. “If the team doesn’t have the energy it needs, they need that captain and leader on the court to bring it out of them.”

Early plans to graduate in May and will play in the 14-team Puerto Rican pro league next summer.

“After I graduate, I want people to remember me as a hard-nosed warrior who left it all out on the court,” he said. “I play every possession like it’s my last.”

By Tom Weber
SIUSalukis.com

CARBONDALE, Ill. – Southern Illinois extended its home winning streak to five games — the longest since 2009 — by clamping down defensively on Northern Iowa in a 63-57 victory on Senior Night at SIU Arena on Wednesday.

The Salukis (13-16, 5-12) are getting hot just as the conference tournament approaches, having won five of their last seven games. They matched last year’s Missouri Valley Conference win total and sent their three seniors — Kendal Brown-Surles, Jeff Early and T.J. Lindsay — out on a high note.

Desmar Jackson scored 18 points and grabbed seven rebounds to lead SIU.

“I’m really happy for our three seniors,” said SIU head coach Barry Hinson. “I’ve always made a big deal about Senior Night. This was my 12th Senior Night as a head coach and I’ve never had a team get beat on Senior Night.”

SIU played its best defensive game of the conference season, holding the visitors to 38 percent shooting and forcing 16 turnovers. Southern’s D recorded 11 steals that led to 15 fast-break points, as the team jumped to a 39-24 halftime advantage. Desmar Jackson had 14 of his game-high 18 points in the first half, including a pair of highlight reel dunks.

“We weren’t strong enough with the ball in traffic and it led to points without our defense being set,” said UNI head coach Ben Jacobson.

The Panthers (17-13, 10-7) struggled to run their offense without leading scorer, Anthony James, who was sidelined with a thigh bruise that he suffered in Saturday’s BracketBusters game. They were just 8-for-32 from 3-point range.

“You’re so far along into a routine of what you’re doing at both ends of the floor, and you take away somebody who is that experienced and that valuable to you at both ends of the floor (as James),” Jacobson said.

UNI played pretty strong defense of its own in the second half, holding the Salukis scoreless for more than eight minutes and trimming a 15-point deficit to five with 4:43 remaining. The Salukis finally broke through when Jackson made a pair of free throws with 2:50 remaining to push SIU’s lead to 50-43.

The Panthers made one final push, cutting the deficit to 58-54 on a 3-pointer by Marc Sonnen with 31 seconds remaining, but Jackson iced the game with two free throws with 22 seconds to go.

“We told the team at halftime, you know they’re going to make a run,” Hinson said. “We know it because we’re good at imploding.”

With one game remaining on the league schedule, SIU is locked into the No. 10 seed at next week’s MVC Tournament in St. Louis — the first time Southern has been No. 10 since the league expanded the conference tournament to 10 teams in 1997.

After starting the conference season 1-11, the Salukis have played free and easy the month of February, not worried about wins and losses, and suddenly the wins are taking care of themselves. Hinson said the turning point was the team’s 37-point loss to Illinois State on Feb. 2.

“After the Illinois State game, we sat down as a group and said we’re not going to stop,” he explained. “We’re going to try to get better every day. Attitude and effort — as long as you do that — don’t worry about the scoreboard.”

The Salukis have gotten stellar play from their three seniors. In his post-game press conference, Hinson noted that it was Lindsay’s 14-point first half in the upset win over Wichita State that got the train rolling. Since then, Early has played spectacularly — he had 14 points, eight rebounds and three steals tonight — and Brown-Surles has been a steady floor general.

“I’ve always written my three seniors a note and put it on their chair for the last home game,” Hinson said. “Basically, I told them I’m proud of them and how they’ve grown as young men this year.”

The Salukis play one more regular-season game at Drake on Saturday, and then will play either Bradley, Drake, Illinois State or Missouri State next Thursday at 8:30 p.m. at the Scottrade Center.