By Eric Stock
NORMAL – It’s a good thing Keyshawn Evans actually likes practice.
“Everything about the game of basketball is fun,” the Illinois State junior point guard noted. “(When) you’ve got 10 guys, the good thing is you don’t have to look to the sidelines to see if someone is coming to get you.”
Injuries have prompted Illinois State men’s basketball coach Dan Muller to scale back practice time a bit during the preseason because he has just eight scholarship players available and in some cases the coaches have stepped in to fill player roles during drills.
“Clearly our numbers are low, they are low in practice, they are going to be low on game nights, so we have to tweak a little bit how aggressive we are defensively,” Muller said. “We really have to stay out of foul trouble which is really almost always the case.”
Junior center David Ndiaye will miss about six weeks with a stress fracture in his right foot. Sophomore guard Matt Hein is expected to be sidelined up to four week with a bone bruise in this right knee. Freshman guard Elijah Clarence is out with a stress fracture. Muller said he would be available in December at the earliest. Junior forward Christian Romine is not practicing with the team as he deals with a personal matter.
Muller added that he expects the team to be close to whole by the start of the Missouri Valley Conference season and the team’s defense-first identity will remain.
The Redbirds are replacing four starters from a team which set a school record with 28 wins and advanced to the NIT last season.
The long returning starter, junior Phil Fayne suggested it’s too early predict how far this year’s Redbird team can go.
“We don’t have any concrete goals yet, but I think those will be coming up very soon,” Fayne teased. “Stay tuned.”
Home cooking
There will be a uniquely local flavor to this year’s Illinois State men’s basketball team. Three newcomers to the Redbirds are from McLean County, including Ridgeview graduate and Lake Land Community College transfer Will Tinsley.
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“It says a lot that we wanted to play for our home team,” the 6-foot-6 junior Tinsley said. “We have a lot of pride for Illinois – Illinois State especially – since we all grew up watching Illinois State play basketball. So it’s big for us to come back home and play for friends and family since we all so it’s that always loved to watch us play in high school.
TInsley played in high school against LeRoy’s Matt Chastain who is wearing ISU red after spending his freshman year at Loyola,where he missed most of the season with a torn ACL.
“Me and Will played a decent amount against each other in high school,” Chastain said. “Now he’s one of my closest friends, we do stuff all the time together.
“I played against Luke (Litwiller) in high school once, so to be friends with him just adds a familiarity.”
Litwiller is a freshman walk-on from Olympia who has taken part in only a few practices since coming on board late in the preseason.
“Playing on this court was always a dream,” Litwiller said. “I came and watched Illinois State games as a kid. It will definitely be cool.”
ISU met the media on Thursday. The ‘Birds play an home exhibition against Lewis on Sunday afternoon, then open the season on Nov, 11 at Florida Gulf-Coast.
Eric Stock can be reached at [email protected].
