The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga men’s basketball team struggled in its nonconference finale Saturday night on the road, never leading in a 101-66 loss to Auburn at Neville Arena.
Now the Mocs (8-5) will begin Southern Conference play against the two teams that shared the league’s regular-season title for 2022-23. First, they’ll head back to Alabama for the second game in a row, visiting Samford (11-2) at 7:30 p.m. Eastern on Wednesday in Birmingham before hosting Furman at 7 p.m. Saturday.
Furman won the SoCon tournament title to clinch the conference’s automatic NCAA tourney bid by beating the Mocs, who made a run to the league final in Dan Earl’s first season as their head coach but were denied a repeat championship. UTC beat second-seeded Samford to start last season’s tourney run.
Against Auburn (10-2), UTC shot just 36% from the field and trailed for the final 39 minutes of the contest, seemingly overwhelmed early by the Tigers’ constant pressure and length on the interior. The hosts jumped out to a 12-0 advantage, with Johni Broome scoring eight quick points inside before sophomore forward Sam Alexis got the Mocs on the board with a 3-pointer 4:39 into the game.
After his early struggles against Broome, Alexis wound up having a solid game with 13 points, six rebounds and three blocks. Honor Huff led the Mocs with 15 points, shooting 4-of-8 from 3-point range.