By John Fay
The Cincinnati Enquirer

OXFORD - The way Miami came out shooting Monday night, the RedHawks had to feel they were going to cool off. They did. Dramatically. Miami never solved Evansville's zone in a 66-58 loss before a crowd of 3,004 at Millett Hall.

The RedHawks made 9-of-29 3-pointers for 31 percent. That number was pretty awful when you consider Miami made its first five, then went 4-for-24 after that. That's 16.6 percent.

"Every college team goes 10 minutes without scoring," Miami coach Charlie Coles said. "We do that every game."

The RedHawks (3-7) have lost four in a row. The game was their final non-conference game of the season.

Miami resumes Mid-American Conference play with a home game Saturday against Central Michigan.

Coles was upbeat after the loss.

"I think we're fine," he said. "Everybody looks at us as 3-7. I certainly think about that. But we're 1-0 in the league. It's Monday. We practice Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.

"We've got to get that game Saturday. That's the biggest game for us in a long time."

Juby Johnson led Miami with 17 points, but he was even better on defense. Johnson held Clint Cuffle, who had been averaging 20.3 points per game, to four points on 1-for-9 shooting.

"Juby played a great game," Coles said. "Cuffle was shooting 60 percent from 3-point range. That's a great job."

Miami came out stroking from 3-point range. The RedHawks hit three 3s in the game's first 92 seconds to go ahead 9-0.

"That was a good thing and a bad thing," Johnson said. "We got trigger-happy and started firing up 3s whenever we got open."

Miami continued to solve Evansville's zone effectively through the first 9‡ minutes. As a result, the RedHawks held a 21-11 lead with 11:32 to go in the half.

That lead was 32-24 after Seals hit a 3 with 6:34 to go in the half.

But the Purple Aces (4-5) eventually stymied Miami.

"The zone was tough," said RedHawks forward Danny Horace, who scored 12 points. "But we just kept working it around the outside instead of taking it in the middle."

Coles took the blame.

"I'll take responsibility," he said. "Some things I thought we could handle we didn't handle. That's got to be coaching."

Evansville ran off eight straight points to go up 39-32 in the first 2‡ minutes of the second half.

Tim Schenke, a sophomore from Elder who had started the last two games for Miami, was a late scratch from Monday night's lineup. He sprained his right ankle during the morning shoot-around, but X-rays were negative.

Evansville	M	FG	Att	FT	Att	R	A	F	TO	TP
Cuffle	36	1	9	2	2	3	0	3	2	4
Hanavan	29	5	8	6	7	5	3	2	0	16
Lytle	23	3	5	4	4	4	1	4	2	12
Burton	22	4	5	2	3	2	0	0	2	11
Wagner	34	3	6	3	4	4	1	1	3	9
Lee	8	0	2	0	0	2	0	0	1	0
Watson	21	2	2	2	2	6	0	2	1	8
Gore	6	0	0	0	0	0	0	1	0	0
Ferguson	21	2	6	2	2	4	1	3	3	6
Totals	200	20	43	21	24	33	7	15	15	66

Team rebounds: 3.

Miami	M	FG	Att	FT	Att	R	A	F	TO	TP
Reed	28	1	3	0	0	2	4	2	0	2
Horace	21	3	7	3	3	2	1	1	1	12
Jameson	24	0	3	0	0	1	1	5	0	0
Mason	31	3	6	0	2	3	3	5	5	7
Johnson	40	5	10	5	6	4	2	2	2	17
Drake	3	0	2	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
Hausfeld	22	1	6	5	6	3	0	1	2	8
Morningstar	12	0	2	0	0	3	0	3	0	0
Seals	19	4	6	2	2	2	0	2	1	12
Hatcher	0+	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
Totals	200	17	45	15	19	22	11	21	11	58

Team rebounds: 2.

Evansville	31	35	-66
Miami	32	26	-58

Attendance-3,004. 3-point goals-Evansville 5-12 (Cuffle 0-3, Hanavan 0-1, Lytle 2-4, Burton 1-1, Watson 2-2, Ferguson 0-1); Miami 9-29 (Reed 0-2, Horace 3-6, Jameson 0-2, Mason 1-3, Johnson 2-6, Drake 0-2, Hausfeld 1-5, Seals 2-3). Officials-Lickliter, Chamberlain, Ingram.