Eastern’s men’s basketball team is starting to turn its awful start around because it is playing as a team.

Head coach Mike Miller has asked one simple thing of his team this year: to play together.

In the first three games, the Panthers struggled with turnovers and shooting. Both of these stats indicate the team was not functioning as a unit.

Teams turn the ball over when they aren’t playing together. If everyone on the court does not know exactly what they are doing, the group does not function well.

In the first three games, the Panthers had 13, 21 and 16 turnovers, respectively. This shows that they were not playing together well, which resulted in a 0-3 record; however, in their last three games they had 13, 11 and 11 turnovers, respectively.

Cutting down on the turnovers has resulted in a 2-1 record in the last three games. That is the key for the Panthers success this season. When they play together they are a tough team to beat.

Another thing that was hurting the Panthers early this season is poor shooting and a lack of assists.

In the two of the first three games they shot under 35 percent from the field. This could have been because of rust, but I think it was because they were not playing as a team.

Eastern averaged just over 10 assists per game in their first three losses. This means that they were taking contested shots, which resulted in the poor shooting percentage.

The Panthers turned it around in the last three games and averaged over 14 assists per game. If they can keep this up they should have a good chance to contend for the Ohio Valley Conference championship. With this group, Eastern will be able to compete with Murray State and Morehead State for the Ohio Valley Conference championship. When the Panthers play together, they have already shown they can beat quality teams. They beat Bradley, 63-56.

There are not many tough non-conference opponents left and a few more wins should spring them into a tough OVC schedule.

Rob Mortell can be reached at 581-7944 or at rdmortell@eiu.edu.