The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga men’s basketball team led or was tied with Southern Conference favorite Wofford for 38 minutes, 7 seconds of game time in their game Monday night. Sophomore center Justin Tuoyo set or tied career highs in scoring and rebounding, while Casey Jones had his second consecutive 20-point game, finishing with 21 to go along with seven rebounds.
And the Mocs lost.
Perspective can be good at times, and although the Mocs (9-7, 2-1) lost 68-64 to the Terriers, it took a herculean effort from guard Karl Cochran for Wofford to win. The 6-foot-1 senior scored a career-high 33 points, with 25 coming in the final 14 minutes.
“I thought we battled,” UTC coach Will Wade said Monday. “We guarded pretty well in the first half. I thought Tuoyo made some good moves, and I thought Casey was his normal self. I thought our guys made some toughness plays, but we didn’t rebound like we wanted to.
“I told the guys it would come down to the rebounding battle, and they out-rebounded us and had more offensive rebounds. That’s a problem when you play a team like that: When it’s more of a possession game, you can’t give up that many offensive rebounds.”
The Mocs led by 14 before Cochran’s heroics. For the game, the Mocs shot a higher percentage than the Terriers and at times looked dominant. In the final three minutes, they matched Wofford — or rather, Cochran — shot for shot, with Ronrico White hitting a 3 from the corner, Jones making a three-point play and Tuoyo finishing a dunk off a White feed, among other scoring plays.
“Coach preaches to us about focusing on the present play,” Jones said. “He hits a 3; we forget about it. Don’t worry about the score; let’s try to get a bucket ourselves. We’d try to get a stop; that didn’t work, so let’s go get a bucket. We’re really simple — we’re going to focus on us. We’re a competitive team: We want to win, but losses happen, and we lost this.
“The next time in the gym, we’re going to be focused on our next game with Western Carolina. We’ll go after that one.”
Wade declared that the Mocs will be fine as they head into the final game of their five-game homestand Thursday against the Catamounts.
“We’ll get back to work, we’ll watch film and prepare hard for Western Carolina on Thursday,” he said. “Nobody’s feeling sorry for us, so it’s not going to make any difference. It’s what you’ve got to do if you’re going to be a good team; it’s about how you respond.
“We’ve got to focus on the next most important thing. We’re not getting it back, so we’ll choose to put all our energy into preparing and getting ready for Western.”
Contact Gene Henley at ghenley@timesfreepress.com. Follow him at twitter.com/genehenleytfp.