University of Tennessee Chattanooga's Queen Alford (10) drives for a shot on Tennessee's Jasmine Jones (2) in the Mocs' 59-57 loss to the Lady Vols Monday evening in Thompson-Boling Arena. Alford's shot would fall and she was fouled on the play and converted the ensuing free throw. Alford led all scorers with 19 points.
photo by Dennis Norwood
KNOXVILLE – This was a basketball game of two halves here at Thompson-Boling Arena Monday night.
The Tennessee Lady Vols won the first one while the Chattanooga Lady Mocs won the second, but when the final horn had sounded, the Lady Vols remained unbeaten after four games with a 59-57 victory.
The Lady Mocs are now 3-2 for the young season.
Te’a Cooper scored on a jumper from the key to give Tennessee a quick 2-0 lead before Chattanooga tied it on a shot from the wing by Keiana Gilbert with 8:17 left in the first quarter.
By the time Alicia Payne scored on a drive down the lane with 2:50 left, the Lady Vols had scored 17 unanswered points and it looked like a blowout was in the making.
Tennessee’s lead was a comfortable 26-7 when the first quarter ended and the difference was still 19 points at 38-19 when the halftime horn sounded.
Who knows what Chattanooga coach Jim Foster offered at the break, but whatever it was worked as the Lady Mocs slowly chipped away at Tennessee’s lead.
The Lady Mocs came thisclose to pulling out an incredible comeback win, but it just wasn’t meant to be.
Diamond DeShields scored back-to-back buckets to extend Tennessee’s lead to 45-25 with 6:14 left in the third quarter, but the Lady Mocs closed out the quarter on an 11-0 run.
Chattanooga then scored eight of the first 12 points in the fourth to close to within two at 49-47 with 6:55 to play on a 3 from redshirt sophomore Ansley Chilton.
It was nip and tuck the rest of the way, but the Lady Mocs were never able to get even again.
DeShields scored on a short bank shot with 1:19 to give Tennessee a 59-53 lead before Payne sank the second of two free throws 18 seconds later. The Lady Mocs chose to not foul on Tennessee’s next possession and they finally got the ball back following a Tennessee miss.
Jasmine Joyner nailed another 3 at the buzzer for the final two-point margin.
“We wanted to make a defensive stop at the end and not commit a foul, but our zone defense changed the tempo of the game,” said Foster in his post-game comments.
“We knew that we had to score a lot of points and to get a lot of stops, but we didn’t want Tennessee running and the zone helped us control the tempo,” he added.
While Foster was somewhat ho-hum with his thoughts, Lady Vol coach Holly Warlick was not.
“It was a win for us, but it wasn’t pretty and I’m not very happy right now,” she said following a disappointing second half.
“We’ll take it and move forward, but we went into the halftime break full of confidence, thinking the game was over. We got that nice lead with our effort on the defensive end, but we held the ball too long and we settled for a lot of bad shots in the second half.
“We have to get the ball inside when the outside shots aren’t falling, but we haven’t figured that out yet. I don’t know what happened in the second half, but we had better figure it out in a hurry.
“We got real casual and relaxed in the second half, but we have to play hard for all 40 minutes or we’ll get beat,” Warlick concluded.
DeShields finished with 17 points to lead the Lady Vols while teammate Mercedes Russell followed with 13 and Bashaara Graves with 10.
Queen Alford was the leader for Chattanooga with 19 points. Chilton finished with 13 after sinking three of four from long range. Joyner was also in double figures with 10 points.
Tennessee won the rebound battle by a 38-30 margin as Graves led the way with 11. Keiana Gilbert had nine to lead Chattanooga.
The Lady Mocs will be at home on Wednesday to host Arkansas State while Tennessee will host Albany on Friday.
Tennessee now leads the all-time series with Chattanooga, 20-2, but it's 2-2 in the past four seasons.
CHATTANOOGA 7 12 17 21 -- 57
TENNESSEE 26 12 7 14 -- 59
CHATTANOOGA (57) – K.
Gilbert 8, Joyner 10, Payne 3, Alford 19, A. Gilbert 2, Vanlandingham, Johnson 2, Chilton 13.
TENNESSEE (59) – Graves 10, Jones 4, Russell 13, Reynolds 2, Cooper 4, Moore, Jackson 4, DeShields 17, Dunbar, Carter 3, Middleton 2.
FIELD GOALS -- Chattanooga 21-48 for 43.8 percent; Tennessee 24-61 for 39.3 percent.
REBOUNDS – Chattanooga 30 (K. Gilbert 9, Joyner 7, Payne 1, Alford 4, Vanlandingham 1, Johnson 3, Chilton 2, Team 3), Tennessee 38 (Graves 11, Jones 2, Russell 4, Reynolds 5, Cooper 2, Jackson 2, DeShields 6, Dunbar 2, Carter 2, Middleton 1, Team 1).
3-POINT GOALS – Chattanooga 7-15 (K. Gilbert 0-2, Joyner 2-4, Payne 0-1, Alford 2-3, Johnson 0-1, Chilton 3-4); Tennessee 3-18 (Reynolds 0-1, Cooper 0-3, Jackson 1-3, DeShields 1-5, Dunbar 0-3, Carter 1-1, Middleton 0-2).
STEALS – Chattanooga 12 (K. Gilbert 3, Joyner 1, Payne 1, Alford 2, A. Gilbert 4, Johnson 1); Tennessee 17 (Graves 3, Russell 1, Reynolds 1, Cooper 4, Jackson 1, DeShields 4, Carter 1, Middleton 2)
ASSISTS -- Chattanooga 15 (K. Gilbert 4, Joyner 2, Payne 5, Alford 1, A. Gilbert 2, Vanlandingham 1); Tennessee 10 (Graves 1, Jones 2, Cooper 4, DeShields 2, Carter 1).
ATTENDANCE – 9,449.
(Email John Hunt at nomarathonmoose@gmail.com)
UTC's Jasmine Joyner (3) and Tennessee's Diamond DeShields (11) battle over a loose ball on the baseline.
photo by Dennis Norwood