The Chattanooga Mocs men’s basketball team completes a road-weary start to the season Tuesday night at Coastal Carolina. Six of the first seven games are on the road for UTC.
“It’ll nice to finally get home and play in front our fans again,” Coach Matt McCall opened. “For the most part, I’ve been proud of our guys and the way they’ve handled this brutal stretch. We’ve been through a lot.
“You open the season with a huge win and then lose Casey Jones for a stretch there.
Basically we went through three games without two starters (counting Chuck Ester). Our guys have done a great job of handling that and staying focused on the next opponent.”
The 4-2 Mocs boast wins over Tennessee, Hiwassee, Central Arkansas and Kennesaw State with losses at North Carolina and Arkansas State. CCU’s Chanticleers are 2-4 against a strong schedule with victories over Coppin State and Southern Utah, while dropping decisions at Alabama, College of Charleston, at BYU and at Wake Forest.
The Mocs are led by Justin Tuoyo’s 16.3 points per game. He adds 8.0 rebounds and 4.0 blocks per contest with the latter ranking fifth in the nation. Greg Pryor scores 14.8 points per game, while Tre’ McLean and Johnathan Burroughs-Cook chip in 10.0 apiece.
Coastal is coached by Cliff Ellis is who in his 42nd year of coaching amassing a record of 793-463, 181-114 in 10 years at CCU. He a trio of double-digit scorers at his disposal. Elijah Wilson leads his squad at 16.7 points per game making 3.5 three-pointers per contest. Jaylen Shaw (11.7) and Demario Beck (10.2) join him with Beck pacing the team with 6.5 rebounds per game.
“One thing you can always count on in a Cliff Ellis-coached team is that they play really, really hard,” McCall added. “He’s got a team that returns four of its top seven off a 21-win team a year ago. Two of the last three years they’ve been in the NCAA Tournament, so it’s going to be a big challenge.
“Long trip today…we need to get off the bus tonight, get some rest and get focused tomorrow because they’re going to present a lot of problems from their pick-and-roll offense. It’ll be the first time this year we see a lot of zone defense, so we need to be ready.”
The 7 p.m., start airs online and over the airwaves at 96.1 the Legend in Chattanooga. Links to live stats, video (CCU webstream) and audio (Mocs Sports Network) are on GoMocs.com’s men’s basketball schedule page. Click the link above for game notes for both programs when available.