The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga men's basketball team picked the coldest night of the season to have its hottest shooting night.
The Mocs, back at home after a rough four games away from McKenzie Arena, shot 52 percent for the game and put five players in double figures to run past Hiwassee, 95-62, on Tuesday. Jerry Johnson led the Mocs (3-5) with 20 points, with David Jean-Baptiste and Donovann Toatley coming off a productive bench to add 19 each.
"To be honest, there is not a whole lot of difference between our bench and our starting five," UTC coach Lamont Paris said. "That can be really good in that it keeps everybody competitive. We put guys in there, and we expect them to play even better than the starting guys were performing."
The Mocs needed the boost when the Tigers, a member of the NCCAA and a team UTC defeated by 48 points in each of the last two seasons, tied the game at 31 on a Naquon Newman layup with 4:30 to play in the first half.
After a timeout, which included a Paris plea for some defensive urgency, Toatley scored on a strong drive to ignite a 12-0 run to end the half. The intensity Paris wanted was prevalent during the run, which featured three forced turnovers, contested jumpers and a blocked shot.
"Defensively, there was no sense of urgency," Paris said. "There were some times where I thought we were in the vicinity of a guy - and it's not like it was terrible defense - but college basketball players are going to make plays and shots.
"There was just no sense of urgency or the energy you need to win Division I basketball games until that late run."
The effort and momentum stayed with the Mocs to start the second half. Johnson scored eight points in the first four minutes of the half to push the lead to 16, with Jean-Baptiste taking over later with 10 points in the final five minutes.
"My teammates got me open," Johnson said of his sizzling second-half start. "I set a good screen and two guys went to help on my man, and he found me at the top of the key, and that's what got it started. Things just picked up after that."
The strong finish after the lackluster start had the Mocs feeling good about themselves for the first time in two weeks.
"It's always good to get a win," Paris said. "I thought we could win and not play well, and that would have been a bad thing for us.
"I guess what stood out the most is I thought some of the highest quality opportunities we got came off some of the most basic things we did. When we got out of doing that stuff, our shot quality went down and we started going one-on-one too much. Against tougher quality opponents you can't do that."
The Tigers (5-5) were paced by sophomore Bernard Bryant's 24 points. His 5-of-8 shooting in the first half had a few fans suggesting the Mocs steal him away.
"Hey, give Hiwassee credit, because they came ready to play," said Justin Brown, who scored 14 points on 7-of-8 shooting and had a team-high eight rebounds. "I think we responded well after they tied it, but they came to play."
Contact Lindsey Young at lyoung@timesfreepress.com or at 423-757-6296; follow on Twitter @youngsports22