Louisiana-Monroe gave the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga men's basketball team one of its six losses last season.
Not this year.
Playing its first Division I home game of the 2016-17 season, UTC smothered the Warhawks and won 79-52 in Saturday's rematch at McKenzie Arena.
"We're not big on revenge," said Mocs coach Matt McCall, pointing out that only two of the ULM guys Saturday played a significant amount in last year's 62-52 win, "but we showed them clips of our game last year. They played harder than us."
The leading ULM scorer in the Nov. 30, 2015, game in Louisiana is gone, but Nick Coppola and Travis Munnings scored 14 and 11 points then. Coppola, who scored 19 in Monday's win over Stephen F. Austin, was held to four shots and five points Saturday. Munnings did score 12, but four came in the last 1:34.
Sam McDaniel also scored 12 for the Warhawks (2-5), but their next highest total was seven. They shot 43.8 percent from the field for the game and made eight of 12 free throws, and they committed 23 turnovers - 15 in the first half, when UTC (6-2) took a 42-21 lead and outscored the visitors 23-1 in points off turnovers. That stat ended up 29-4 for the game.
The Mocs shot 48.2 percent from the field and made only 10 turnovers against ULM's aggressive defense. They hit 17 of 25 free throws and eight of 27 3-point tries, while the Warhawks were able to get off only seven 3s, making two.
UTC got four 3s and 16 points from senior point guard Greg Pryor and 14, 13 and 12 points from Justin Tuoyo, Makinde London and Tre' McLean. Tuoyo led the Mocs with six rebounds and everybody with three steals.
UTC never trailed in the game and went ahead to stay at 6-4 on a Casey Jones tip-in with 16:47 to go in the first half. From 14-8 at 11:02, the margin swelled to 32-13 on a London three-point play at 6:32 and to 54-23 on a Pryor jump shot four minutes into the second half.
"I've been really, really proud of our team these past three games coming out of New York," McCall said. "We really hadn't had time to practice, but we got some good practices and we've made some strides. The last two games, especially, defensively we have been disruptive. When we focus on that, the offensive end takes cares of itself."
He pointed out that ULM had been averaging "seven or eight" turnovers a game and "hangs their hat" on playing hard, so he was particularly pleased that his Mocs beat the visitors at their own strength.
"We pride ourselves on defense. We're a defensive team - that's our identity," Tuoyo said. "We knew we had to play hard, and we all did that. Everybody who came in did that."
The 6-foot-10 senior didn't get to play at ULM last year but he was there and saw it, and he admitted that "we felt like we should've had that one. When you watch that game you see they definitely outplayed us in every way."
Said Pryor: "Monroe is a really good team, and they've got a lot of good players, but we've been focusing on hanging our hats on defense and rebounding. That's what we do.
"Trust and loving each other" are the secrets to good team defense and effort plays, Pryor said.
"Getting stops is always fun," he added.
One of UTC's fiercest rivals of the past, Marshall, visits for a 7 p.m. game Tuesday, and McCall said he would make sure his players know how important that game is "to the community." In turn, he said, he hopes a lot of fans show up to see it.
The attendance Saturday was listed at 2,655.
Contact Ron Bush at rbush@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6291.