Saturday at McKenzie Arena was a night to remember and one to forget.
The university staff and Mocs fans welcomed home with open arms players and staff from the 1977 NCA D-II national championship team with standings ovations, handshakes and commemorate basketballs and a collective “thanks you” for all they did for Mocs basketball.
On the other hand, the current Moc players had hoped to show the 1977 players that they can play well, too, but didn’t.
The defending Southern Conference champs did hold visiting East Tenn. State to 16 points under its season average, but generated little offense in a 65-51 loss.
Playing before a season-best crowd of 6,402 all decked out in 1977 white commemorative t-shirts, the Mocs lost in every way.
“They were better than us on every spot on the floor – much better,” said UTC coach Matt McCall.
“Yet if you told me we would hold them to 65 points I would have said we would have a chance to win. We did play well defensively.”
But the Mocs had little chance and in the end no answers for the Buccaneers.
The Bucs led in FG% (52.2% -42.2%), rebounding ( 29-25), less turnovers (19-17), more steals (14-6) and the list goes on and on.
Bucs coach Steve Forbes said, “ we came in with a three-point game plan - be gritty, be grimy (go after loose balls) and play together the entire game and I think we did that tonight.”
They did that in spades.
The visitors (22-6, 12-3), one half game back in the win column of first place Furman (who also lost at home by a large margin (21 pts) Saturday to UNCG, also led with bench points (17-12), points in the paint (28-26) and points off turnovers (26-13).
“We were able to keep UTC off balance and using our 1-3-1 zone defense with a 6-8 guy at the top worked well for u,” said Forbes.
Slow Start then Fast After That: ETSU was 1-4 from the field in the first five minutes of the game, but then was 24-43 (58%) the rest of the way.
McCall said,” I think our guys were ready and prepared, but when things are not going well, you can’t get it back in one play.
“The game didn’t go our way and we didn’t handle the ball well. When you don’t shoot well and commit 19 turnovers you are not going to win.”
The Mocs have a couple of weeks to get it going well as the SoCon tournament will be a war with no easy games to the championship.
The other nine SoCon teams respect UTC and the talented players dressed in Blue and Gold, but they are not afraid of them. There is a difference.
The Mocs can play with anyone in the league on any given night, and coach McCall has preached all season that it comes down to the three games in March (SoCon tourney).
contact B.B. Branton at william.branton@comcast.net
Wild Wednesday: Furman travels to ETSU Wednesday with first place on the line, while third place UNCG (11-4) is at Mercer and fourth place UTC (10-5) is at Samford.
Senior Night: The Mocs hope many of the same fans who were in McKenzie Saturday will return this coming Saturday for a doubleheader Senior Night
The UTC women host Wofford at 2 p.m. and the men take on The Citadel at 5. The women also have a home game with Thursday at 6:30 p.m. with Furman.