GAME NOTES: The Missouri Valley Conference Tournament kicks off Thursday at the Scottrade Center with the ninth-seeded Southern Illinois Salukis taking on the eighth-seeded Bears of Missouri State.

The winner of this clash will move on to the second round of the tournament to take on top-seeded Wichita State - this year's MVC champion - on Friday.

Southern Illinois backs into the conference tournament after losing five of its last six games of the regular season. That one win, however, came for the Salukis in the season finale against Drake, 63-57. SIU finished the 2014-15 campaign with an 11-20 overall ledger, and a 4-14 mark against conference competition.

Missouri State dropped its final game of the regular season to Loyola-Chicago, 65-51, which means the Bears have lost six of their last eight prior to this meeting with Southern Illinois. Missouri State wasn't much better than SIU in league play, going just 5-13 against the MVC.

Southern Illinois and Missouri State have met 77 times in their series rivalry, and the all-time matchup between the programs is rather contentious. The Salukis hold a 40-37 advantage over the Bears, but Missouri State has won two straight this season over SIU.

It was a disappointing ending to the regular season for Southern Illinois, despite the fact that the team won its last contest over Drake. The Salukis connected on a healthy 52.1 percent of their shots in the win, and made 9- of-13 from the free-throw line to gain an edge over the Bulldogs. Anthony Beane tallied 17 points to pace the squad on 7-of-12 shooting, while Sean O'Brien added 14 points with four rebounds. Bola Olaniyan netted seven points and pulled down a team-best eight boards in the win, in which Drake only got to the free-throw line for four attempts.

Beane finished the regular season as the leading scorer for Southern Illinois. His 16.5 ppg was the only average in double figures for the squad, as Beane ranked second in the MVC in scoring. Jordan Caroline was on the edge of double-digit scoring for the Salukis in 2014-15, adding in 9.5 ppg with a team-best 6.4 rpg mark. O'Brien, one of the team's starting forwards, led all Salukis with 51 assists in his 31 games played. The team is netting just 60.3 ppg this season on 42.3 percent shooting, and is allowing opponents to collect 62.6 ppg in the same frame. The Salukis have done well on the defensive end in terms of forcing turnovers, having registered 412 takeaways this season.

Missouri State hung tough with Loyola-Chicago in the first half of Saturday's contest, as the Bears only trailed the Ramblers by two points when the teams broke for the intermission. But Missouri State dipped down to 39.1 percent shooting in the second half, which allowed the host Ramblers to open the lead up en route to the win. Austin Ruder netted 14 points on 4-of-7 shooting to pace the Bears in the defeat, while Gavin Thurman came off the bench to chip in 10 points in 19 minutes of action. Camyn Boone scored eight points with a team-best seven rebounds for the Bears.

Missouri State could have used leading scorer Marcus Marshall down the stretch, but the junior guard only played in 14 games this season and sat the second half of the campaign because of personal reasons. That really put a damper on Missouri State's scoring ability, since the second-leading scorer for the Bears this season was Boone at 8.6 ppg. Boone and Ruder (8.2 ppg) were the top two point getters for Missouri State, which averaged just 60.1 ppg this season on a mere 40.7 percent shooting. The team defensively let opponents net 64.5 ppg on 42.7 percent shooting, which included a 36.3 percent mark from 3-point distance. Boone led the team on the boards, averaging 5.3 rpg, while Dorrian Williams dished out 4.4 apg to finish second in the conference.

Neither of these teams matches up well against Wichita State, so whichever team wins should expect a nasty second-round clash. Both teams are offensively challenged, but there was no discernable scorer for Missouri State this year, which will hurt them in this one.