The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga men's basketball team has made the turn for home. Game 16 -- a sluggish 58-45 home win over visiting UNC Greensboro on Monday -- cemented the Mocs' grade a step beyond the halfway point of the regular season.
It's an incomplete. Or maybe more accurately, an incongruent.
The numbers are difficult to decipher. UTC's five-game winning streak is its best run of the season, but the first-half performance against the Spartans was arguably its shakiest of the year.
Monday's Southern Conference win was as much UNCG's defiencies as UTC's deft. But staying within striking range, regardless of the foe and the circumstances, is an asset, and the Mocs (10-6, 2-1) used it again Monday.
The first half was littered with miscues by each side. The teams combined for 46 points, 43 missed shots and 16 turnovers in the first 20 minutes. If they had enacted the "next basket wins" rule, it appeared at times in the first half that the teams would have missed curfew.
"I was just glad we got to double figures, to be honest with you," UTC coach John Shulman said. "We didn't panic at halftime. We're starting to get this thing figured out, and a new guy is stepping up every night."
As disjointed as the first half looked, though, the Mocs made the second half appear effortless.
A Keegan Bell layup, a two-handed dunk by Jeremy Saffore and a Ty Patterson 3-pointer in the first 150 seconds of the second half erased the first-half hole. Leading for the first time at 27-26, the Mocs never looked back.
"Coach was disappointed," Bell said of the halftime message. "He said it was probably the worst half of basketball we have ever played at Chattanooga. He challenged us."
Said Patterson, who missed the first eight games of the season: "You just have to keep playing though it."
To be fair, circumstances have forced Shulman and Co. to shuffle and reshuffle their cards. Injuries, suspensions and inconsistencies have caused the Mocs to use nine different starting lineups in their 16 games. The pieces have been puzzling, but make no mistake, this puzzle has quality pieces.
"We're going to have great depth," said Shulman, who mentioned that Dante Harvey and Troy Cage will return in the days ahead. "But that can drive you crazy because you're inconsistent.
"It's got to be tough for other coaches to prepare for, though, because if I don't know who's going to show up, I know they don't know."
When these Mocs are at their cruising -- like a 25-2 run that overlapped the end of the first half and the opening minutes of the second -- they're tough. They can score and they can defend. The grace of the Mocs playing well, however, magnifies their struggles. The ease and effectiveness of the second half made the first half all the more disconcerting.
"We were lucky to be in it at the half," said Shulman, who recorded his 100th career win Monday. "It was dreadful, but we were still in it."
The Mocs stick together, and they stick around. Both qualities are valuable commodities in high times and low.
The good far outweighed the bad against UNCG and in the last three weeks. But streaky basketball teams can beat anyone and lose to anybody -- it just depends on which version takes a stronger hold.
"We're getting better defensively, but I'm not going to tell you we're a good defensive team," Shulman said. "We're getting better on the glass, but I'm not going to tell you that. We can shoot the ball well, but we were 2-for-13 from the 3-point line (in the first half).
"I guess (our strength) is finding a way to win. We've got a kind of a scrappiness."
A step around the halfway point and the Mocs are still searching. That's not a bad thing considering all the roster unrest. UTC is deep and has enough offensive firepower with Patterson and Co. that its best basketball is almost certainly ahead. But its worst is always around the corner, too.
I guess it's simple, really. They are either describably incomplete or completely indescribable.