UTC's Lance Stokes (3) rebounds the ball ahead of Western Carolina's Justin Browning during the Mocs' SoCon basketball game against the Catamounts on Thursday, Jan. 8, 2015, at McKenzie Arena in Chattanooga.Lance Stokes has been known to oversleep workouts and later show up in Washington Redskins socks and white boat shoes. There is a chance that, regardless of the weather, he will be in shorts.
Prior to his University of Tennessee at Chattanooga basketball games, he usually is smiling and bouncing alongside teammate Eric Robertson. He already has started looking toward his planned career as a sports writer and has done both radio play-by-play and print coverage of high school basketball games.
Simply put, he's the most interesting man ... on the Mocs team.
"You never know what Lance will be up to during the day," junior forward Casey Jones said Monday. "Yesterday he was telling me he had a radio show, and I was thinking, 'Oh, man, what's he going to talk about?' He's a character, but he's also one of my closest friends on the team."
Said UTC coach Will Wade: "Lance has a wide range of interests and a wide variety of likes. I appreciate how different he is. He's not concerned about being mainstream, and he does his own thing.
"He's a unique guy, but a great kid."
Wade has described the 6-foot-6 senior out of Orlando, Fla., as a "Renaissance man." During his career, Stokes has started 40 games while splitting time between the 3 and 4 positions. He and fellow seniors Martynas Bareika and Ronrico White are in their second seasons under Wade after spending a pair of seasons under former coach John Shulman.
"My career has been interesting. It's been cool, though," Stokes said. "I've enjoyed doing different things, enjoyed different roles and seeing everything that college basketball has to offer -- the highs and the lows; playing a lot, not playing a lot; different coaching staffs.
"I think I've experienced college in a very unique and different way, but I've thoroughly loved my college experience."
Along with the transformation of his career, Stokes has seen the transformation of his team throughout the 2014-15 season. The Mocs were 3-5 after a Dec. 2 blowout loss at home to Georgia, but they have won 11 of their last 13 games, with five consecutive wins. Stokes, who is considered the team's best on-court communicator -- not surprising, considering that he is a communications major -- has been a big part of that.
"It's been amazing, but I think the slow start was an expected transition," Stokes said. "We had a lot of new guys, and except for a few pieces it was a brand-new look team. Last year was great, but this year we knew we would have to jell and bond. We expected growing pains early in the season, but we've gone through them.
"We've learned a lot and grown both individually and as a team."
In his reporting role, he did some play-by-play recently of the Hixson-Howard basketball game, and he'll be doing baseball and softball once the Mocs' season ends -- and anything else that could be assigned to him as part of his internship with River City Sports. Chances are, whatever the assignment is, he'll find a way to make it entertaining.
"When it's time to work hard, I try to work hard, but when it's time to shut up and listen to Coach Wade, I listen to Coach Wade and follow the rules," he said. "When it's time to have fun, I have fun. Basketball is supposed to be fun, so I like to have as much fun as possible, because I know it's coming to an end soon."
Contact Gene Henley at ghenley@timesfreepress.com. Follow him at twitter.com/genehenleytfp.