Any human being with at least part of a soul had to feel a bit sorry for the Southern Illinois-Edwardsville men's basketball team after the Wisconsin Badgers rolled over the Cougars 88-58 Tuesday at the Kohl Center.

Edwardsville had just nine players dressed for the game. Coach Lennox Forrester usually has 10 to choose from, but leading scorer and rebounder Mark Yelovich had to stay back because of a "family emergency."

"Him being our leading scorer, leading rebounder, we missed him a lot and he's a playmaker also at his size and position," Forrester said of his 6-foot-5 freshman forward. "So we definitely missed him."

Obviously it probably wouldn't have mattered in the outcome of the game. But just consider the task the Cougars faced Tuesday: playing a UW team that's lost seven home games in seven-plus years under coach Bo Ryan; coming off a weekend in which they played three games in three days; doing it without their best player; and to top it all off, this is Edwardsville's first season competing at the NCAA Division I level.

Anyway, here's a few other tidbits from the game:

- Marcus Landry didn't have to carry the scoring load, but he was a force on defense with five blocks and three steals.

Landry has eight blocks through two games. Think he can keep up that pace?

- Trevon Hughes has taken 13 shots so far this season. Through two games last year he had fired 25. He's looked patient and under control.

- It's funny how quickly things can change. After the Red-White scrimmage, Keaton Nankivil looked like he was due to make a big jump. Obviously that could still happen since it's a long season.

But Nankivil has just one rebound through two games, and had two points in 13 minutes Tuesday. Ryan said Nankivil "needs to be more active."

- It's unclear whether Ian Markolf playing means Jared Berggren will redshirt. It seems like there's only room for one of them in the rotation, but I guess time will tell.

- Hughes spent some time at shooting guard alongside Jordan Taylor. That was a change from the opener, when Taylor merely spelled Hughes at the point.