Mercer men’s basketball coach Bob Hoffman expected it to go in.
Greg Pryor always expects his shots to go in, no matter the situation.
The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga junior point guard took – and made – what might have been the shot of the game in the Mocs’ 74-62 home win over the Bears on Tuesday, hitting a contested 3-pointer late in the shot clock with UTC hanging onto a 60-58 lead with 2:36 to play in the Southern Conference matchup.
“We know he’s always going to take those big shots. He’s better at the end,” Hoffman said. “He’s hit all kinds of great shots in his career, which is what he does. Throughout the course of the game, he always gets everybody involved. He could take over a game whenever he wanted to, but that was a big shot and he definitely drained it.
“We were right there, had a great defensive possession and were right where we needed to be, and then he just raised up and hit a shot while being guarded. That’s what basketball’s about sometimes. You do all the right things, but a guy can do better than you, and he was on that possession that time.”
Pryor added four free throws as the Mocs finished the game on a 14-4 run to improve to 13-2 this season, including 2-0 in the SoCon. They travel to Furman on Saturday for the first game of a doubleheader against the Paladins. The men play at 12:30, with the women following at 3 in Timmons Arena.
The men’s game will be televised on Fox Sports Southeast, while the women will be shown online via ESPN3.
UTC men’s coach Matt McCall had a talk with Pryor after Saturday’s win at The Citadel to open SoCon play. The two watched a lot of video, breaking down ways McCall thought his point guard could be better, and it’s obvious Pryor listened – he finished with 17 points and 10 assists (and only three turnovers) against Mercer for the first double-double of his career.
McCall initially didn’t like the shot attempt that Pryor took against Mercer, though.
That is, until it went in.
“It’s one of those where [you’re saying], ‘Please don’t shoot it.’ Boom, it goes in,” McCall said. “As a coach, there’s got to be a balance between me and him. I don’t want to take away that fearlessness from him. If that shot doesn’t go in, they come down and score, it’s a tie game. Everyone is saying, ‘Why did Greg shoot that ball?’ But that’s part of who he is as a player.”
It’s that fearlessness that has made Pryor one of UTC’s most indispensable players, as well as its primary ball-handler and the guy the Mocs want to have the ball in crucial situations.
One only has to go back as far as Dec. 12, when Pryor calmly nailed two free throws with 5.3 seconds to play in the Mocs’ win at Dayton, to know about his calm demeanor in the clutch.
“I just looked at it like a normal shot,” Pryor said of Tuesday’s 3-pointer. “I shot the shot like I would any other shot. I didn’t think about the clock or the point situation. I had to shoot the ball, so I just shot it and it went in.”
Contact Gene Henley at ghenley@timesfreepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @genehenleytfp.