SPARTANBURG, S.C. - Down eight points with a raucous Wofford crowd making things difficult, the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga men's basketball team never flinched Saturday night.
UTC finished the game on a 23-7 run, holding the home team to one field goal in the final 8:58, and claimed a 73-65 Southern Conference win in front of 3,004 in the Terriers' next-to-last game in Benjamin Johnson Arena.
The win snapped Wofford's four-game win streak, which included a 131-127, four-overtime victory over Samford on Thursday. The Terriers previously had only one loss all season at home, 104-103 in overtime against The Citadel on Jan. 2.
It also gave the Mocs a crucial split in their toughest two-game road stretch in league play this season, with the two opponents - Furman and Wofford - sitting at 19 combined wins in the SoCon this year. The Mocs will be at Virginia Military Institute on Wednesday.
"This was huge," UTC coach Matt McCall said. "I've been fortunate enough to be a part of a lot of wins, but I don't know if I've ever been a part of a win with more adversity thrown at this team in the last 24-48 hours. To see how they responded, this was a terrific win against a great team in a great environment.
"I couldn't be prouder of this group."
Greg Pryor scored the first 14 points for UTC (18-7, 9-4) and finished with a team-high 19. Justin Tuoyo had 11, while Casey Jones and Rodney Chatman had 10 each. Nat Dixon added nine and Tre' McLean had seven to go along with four assists. Dixon and McLean hit three 3s in a 1:46 span of the second half as part of a 12-1 run that gave the Mocs the lead for good.
"We've seen it all," Pryor said. "We've been through all types of adversity, been in all different types of positions in games, been up, been down. We did what we do: Play our type of basketball and the game will turn out in our favor, and if it doesn't, we can just live with it knowing we tried, played our hardest and played our game."
Wofford led for more than 28 minutes, building a 10-point first-half lead before the Mocs used a 6-0 run in the final 1:15 to trim the lead to 35-31. Wofford controlled the early part of the second half. After a layup by Fletcher Magee - who led all scorers with 26 points - put Wofford up 58-50 with 8:58 to play, the Terriers did not hit another field goal until Magee made a 3-pointer from the corner with 1:08 remaining, a span of 12 consecutive misses. The Mocs outscored Wofford 17-2 until Magee's shot.
"As the game went on, our focus got higher," Jones said. "We kept pounding the rock. I don't want to take anything away from Wofford: Some of their guys played 58, 60 minutes the other night and it took a toll on them, but at the same time I'm not going to take anything away from us. We played our heart out; this was one of the hardest wins we've had all season."
The Terriers shot 34 percent from the field in the second half, compared to the Mocs' 63 percent. Magee was 10-for-19 from the floor, but starting point guard Eric Garcia, who entered the game averaging 15.3 points per game, was held to two. He did have 10 assists.
Ryan Sawvell had 16 points and 11 rebounds for the Terriers (13-14, 8-6).
"I've had that team before," Wofford coach Mike Young said of the Mocs. "You get five, six seniors, and those guys are really smart, great players, and they played with an incredible level of savvy and basketball IQ. They've seen a lot of players.
"It just wasn't meant to be. The basketball gods may have smiled upon us Thursday, but they frowned upon us tonight."