By JOHN BOHNENKAMP

MACOMB, Ill. — Western Illinois’ men’s basketball team came into Thursday’s home game against Southeast Missouri State ranked 347th out of 351 teams in free-throw percentage.

And then all the Leathernecks did in the final 4 minutes, 47 seconds of the 68-61 win was make every free throw.

The Leathernecks (9-6 overall, 2-0 Ohio Valley Conference) were 12-of-12 from the line, closing out their sixth consecutive win.

“Now that conference has started, little things are going to matter,” said guard JJ Kalakon, who had the first four free throws in that final stretch on his way to a 16-point game. “So it’s going to come down to taking care of the ball, free throws, boxing out. Just the little things that can help get wins.”

“Like he said, we’ve got to do the little things,” said forward Jesiah West, who made the last two with eight seconds left to provide the final margin. “We did that tonight.”

It was similar to Sunday’s 78-70 win at SIU-Edwardsville, when the Leathernecks made eight consecutive free throws in the final 35 seconds.

The Leathernecks led for almost 31 minutes of the game, but were never comfortable, and it’s something coach Chad Boudreau said they need to expect throughout the rest of the OVC schedule.

“It just turned into a grindy game,” Boudreau said. “But that’s what conference play is going to be. Conference play is going to be grindy, be tough. You just have to pin your ears back, win them, and go on to the next one.”

It was obvious to Boudreau that this game was going to go the way it did. Western Illinois fell down 5-0 early despite having good looks inside on their first two possessions.

“We had a decent rhythm going,” Boudreau said. “We just didn’t finish the shots. We had the opportunity to jump on them early and take the air out of them.”

The Leathernecks went on a 9-0 run after that poor start, and led 36-26 at halftime. But SEMO (5-10, 1-2) kept chipping away at Western Illinois, taking a 53-52 lead with 8:12 to play. But the Leathernecks took the lead back on a Ryan Myers drive with 7 minutes to go, and they would not trail again.

“They did a good job of fighting back,” Kalakon said. “But we kept our composure, and did what we needed to do to finish the game.”

It was a dominating rebounding effort for the Leathernecks, one of the nation’s top teams on the boards. Western Illinois had a 50-33 edge, including 23 offensive rebounds.

Drew Cisse, fourth in the nation in rebounding, had 14 boards, but seven of the eight Leathernecks who played had at least one rebound.

“That’s how we are,” West said. “Everybody goes to the glass.”

Kalakon, who also had eight rebounds, was aggressive at both ends of the court, constantly attacking the basket for inside shots.

“Just pounding it in the paint, going straight through to the basket,” Kalakon said.

Myers also had 16 points for the Leathernecks, who have won seven of their last eight.

“We didn’t know there was a winning streak,” Kalakon said. “We just know there’s a longer goal of winning the conference.”

That’s something Boudreau appreciates.

“We try to look at everything, not look backwards, try to get better, ” Boudreau said. “We’ll celebrate tonight, then tomorrow it’s back to 0-0 and getting ready for Lindenwood (on Saturday).”