The Chattanooga Mocs picked up a crucial road win in thrilling fashion, 86-82 in double overtime, at VMI. Chattanooga improves to 21-9, 14-3 in the Southern Conference, while the hosts fall to 11-17, 7-10 in league play.
“It wasn’t pretty by any stretch of the imagination,” coach Will Wade said. “Good teams find a way to win, and we found a way to win. These were two highly motivated teams tonight. VMI was extremely motivated for the bye, and our guys were motivated for the win.”
Eric Robertson had a game-high 19 points leading four Mocs in double figures. Casey Jones added a double-double with 17 points and 10 rebounds. Ronrico White chipped in 15 points, six rebounds and six assists, while Greg Pryor tallied 13 points and five assists.
Phillip Anglade (26) and Julian Eleby (25) combined for 51 points. Eleby just missed a triple-double with nine rebounds and seven assists. Anglade had five rebounds and a game-high six blocks.
The Mocs came back from eight points down in the second half to take a three-point advantage, 67-64, on Jones’ layup with 87 seconds to play, After the teams traded defensive stops, the Keydets had the ball for a final possession. Eleby’s three-pointer with 0.9 seconds remaining was blocked by Justin Tuoyo, but a foul was called on Jones. Eleby calmly sank three to send the game into overtime.
White drained a three with 1:41 to play in the extra period for a three-point UTC lead, 72-69. Trey Chapman answered with a layup followed by two Anglade free throws to for a 73-72 VMI lead with 40 seconds to go.
Jones drove the paint and scored on a jumper to get the lead back to one, 74-73. Anglade drew a foul with just under 12 seconds to go, but he made one of the two to tie it at 74-all. Jones jumper from the right baseline was off to send it into a second overtime period.
Tre’ McLean gave the visitors the lead for good with a three to open the second extra frame. Duke Ethridge’s three with 1:27 to go at the end of the shot clock extended it to five, 84-79. Chattanooga made just two of five free throws down the stretch, but it held the Keydets at bay defensively to capture the 86-82 win.
“We could have made it easier for ourselves if we shot free-throws better,” Wade added. “We missed way too many free-throws (12-24 for the game), especially in the second half (4-10). We didn’t do a great job at the foul line, but despite all of that, we were able to survive it. We got 70 shots, we out-rebounded them again (46-39) and we only turned the ball over 13 times for a 50-minute game. That’s pretty good against them. We’ll take it.”
VMI came into the contest averaging a nation’s best 11.9 three-pointers made per game. The Mocs limited it to just six in 24 attempts (25.0%). The Keydets shot 35.9 percent from the field (14-39) and 13.3 percent from 3pt range (2-15) over the final 30 minutes after building a 36-31 halftime lead.
Chattanooga led by as many as seven early in the game before going ice cold from the field. It was up 28-26 on Robertson’s three-point play at 7:09. It took more than five minutes before they’d score again leading to a 10-0 VMI run.
The Mocs close out the regular season Saturday at UNCG. Tipoff is at 5 p.m., in the Greensboro Coliseum. The game airs on the SoCon Digital Network online as well as the Mocs Sports Network on the radio at US 101 the Legend at 96.1 FM in Chattanooga. Gameday links to video (SDN), audio (MSN) and live stats are available on GoMocs.com. Follow @GoMocsMBB on Twitter for live updates.