This is more like it.

Back to Ohio Valley Conference football, back to dominating on defense.

The Panthers defense looked more like last year’s version in Saturday’s 21-0 win than they had all season.

Defensive coordinator Roc Bellantoni said the performance might have been one of the best he’s seen since he arrived in 2001.

Eastern forced three turnovers against a team that had not turned the ball over all year.

They held Southeast Missouri to 101 total yards.

The Redhawks fumbled the ball five times, even though Eastern only recovered one of those.

This is a defense without Clint Sellers, the linebacker whose season was over on the first play of the first game against Illinois. He was the team’s best player and his absence has given Donald Thomas a chance to be the main guy.

Matt Westrick is a transfer who was plugged in when Sellers went down.

Bellantoni described his progress this season as night-and-day when comparing how he played in the first game to how he played Saturday.

Westrick finished with nine assisted tackles.

But believe it or not, there was something Bellantoni reluctantly pointed to as a negative in Saturday’s game.

He said the defense has to make more big plays like they did last year.

Up until this week, the defense was a big reason Eastern was under .500.

It’s hard to blame them for last week’s game against Hawaii.

Hawaii is one of the top offenses in Division I-A.

Heck, it’s even hard to blame them for the loss against Illinois. I-A teams have bigger players, period.

But the game against Illinois State was a tough one.

They gave up more than 400 total yards in the 44-30 loss.

Welcome back to the OVC.

The Panthers’ defense looked like the Chicago Bears’ defense this weekend.

They swarmed to the ball, they didn’t allow the big play, and they stopped everything first-year head coach Tony Samuel tried to run against them.

SEMO could not run.

SEMO could not pass.

SEMO could not score.

When they did move the ball, the Panthers responded.

The Redhawks gained 44 yards on a third-quarter drive but it came to a stop when linebacker Lucius Seymour intercepted the ball.

Those are the kinds of things they did last year on a more frequent basis.

They are also the things the Panthers should expect more of now that they are back to OVC play.