PEORIA — Bradley coach Geno Ford knows Jay Spoonhour and knows the new Eastern Illinois men’s basketball coach’s situation.
A year ago Ford came from Kent State to coach a Bradley team that was 12-20 the previous season.
He waved no magic wand in his first Bradley season of just 7-25 but now he is looking to build around four returning starters when his Braves play host to an 8 p.m. opener Friday at Peoria’s Carver Arena against Spoonhour making his EIU coaching debut.
“I think we’re better for sure,” Ford said. “I think just how Coach Spoonhour is experiencing coming to a program that’s not winning, you can’t rush it through. You can be very excitable but it takes time. I believe we’re going to be better but we’ll see.”
Other than Friday night, Ford is likely to be rooting for Spoonhour, who takes over an EIU program that has had just one winning season since a 2001 NCAA tournament appearance and had the top six scorers from last season’s 12-17 team either graduate or transfer.
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“I know Jay,” Ford said. “We have a mutual friend in Bobby Steinburg, an assistant at Kent State. Eastern made an unbelievably good hire. I say that, one, because of the basketball background but the other thing is he is just an unbelievably good guy. It’s not going to take long for him to get it going. I just hope it takes at least two games.”
Spoonhour, coming to Eastern after three years at Moberly Community College that followed a stint as interim head coach at UNLV, passes along kind words about Ford as well.
“He’s a good coach,” Spoonhour said. “He recruited a guy or two we had at Moberly. He’s in a similar situation where he has a great program and a great history and he’s trying to get them back.
The son of longtime successful coach Charlie Spoonhour, Jay knows plenty about Bradley’s tradition.
“When I was a ballboy at Drake they had Hersey Hawkins and those guys,” the new EIU coach said. “I just know any team I’ve rooted for that’s gone over there, they didn’t win.”
The exception was when he coached UNLV.
“We made a shot at the buzzer and got out of town,” Spoonhour said. “If it would have gone any longer we wouldn’t have won.
“The fans, if there’s one place in the country that knows basketball, it’s Peoria. When they get it going there it’s going to be fun again. The place itself it will be a shock to our players.”
Spoonhour is waiting to see how his inexperienced team handles the distractions of a season-opening road game.
“The whole thing is trying to keep it clear in your head what you’re trying to do,” he said. “It’s very easy to go out in road games and lose your concentration. We do concentrate pretty well and do a good job of keeping our heads on straight. It’s when you get out away from things in practice when you’re out on your own.”
This game also is a clash of two former Dodge City Community College teammates – EIU’s R.J. McGee, who averaged 18.7 points for the Jayhawk League school in Kansas last season and Bradley’s Tyshon Pickett, who averaged 14.9 points and 8.9 rebounds on that team.
“They’ve probably been talking about this for a while,” Spoonhour said. “That’s another thing you get into — we’re going to need all the concentration we can on what we do.”
The fact that Ford made recruiting trips to Dodge City games or practices to see Pickett gives him at least some idea of what to expect from McGhee.
“I saw him probably play more than anyone else on their roster,” Ford said. “The bulk of that roster I’d say we’re generally unfamiliar. The (Austin) Akers kid, I’ve seen him play in high school but haven’t seen what he’s done with them.
“I’ve watched two games from when Jay was at Moberly but to be honest the first we’ll see of (Eastern) will be the first half of our game (Friday night).”
Spoonhour has no doubt checked some game films of last season’s Bradley team but likewise may have to learn about Ford’s second edition of the Braves after the season-opening tip-off.
The Braves posted exhibition wins of 68-54 over Upper Iowa and 70-42 over Wisconsin-Parkside.
“The two exhibition games to be honest I was pleased,” Ford said. “We didn’t play great but Wisconsin-Parkside had the chance to beat Wisconsin-Milwaukee and Upper Iowa played close against Southern Illinois. We feel we fared a little better against those teams than the other teams did. We don’t have a lot of championships the last few years so we’re focusing on those positives.”
Bradley may get a boost from 6-foot-8 Canadian Shayok Shayok, who started 26 games last season, sat out the exhibition games with an injury but is expected to see some action Friday night.
Contact Nielsen at bnielsen@jg-tc.com or 217-238-6856.