Sometimes in sports a team will win games with superior play. Sometimes it will lose with poor play or just fall to a better performance.
Sometimes, though, Lady Luck gets her hands on an outcome and if you happen to be on her good side, as the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga men's basketball team was Saturday, you just smile and take it.
The Mocs won their third consecutive Southern Conference game, 73-71 over The Citadel, when the Bulldogs' Lew Stallworth missed a three-foot runner in the lane at the buzzer.
UTC (10-10, 5-2) missed three free throws in the final 19 seconds that could have sealed the game, allowing the Bulldogs (9-9, 1-6) a shot at sending it to overtime or winning it outright.
"We missed some free throws at the end, and we have to get better at that," Mocs forward Ramon Vila said with a shake of his head. "Also, we had a little bit of luck on that last shot. It could have easily gone down, but it didn't happen and that was it."
It's not like the Mocs didn't do good things. Kevin Easley, after a subpar outing Thursday, was stellar Saturday, scoring 22 points - tying Stallworth for game honors - and pulling down a game-best 12 rebounds. Though they shot just 7-for-25 from 3-point range, the Mocs were 19-of-29 inside the arc.
UTC's defensive performance may have been its best of the season, with the Mocs holding the nation's highest-scoring team 23 points under its normal output. The Mocs went in with a game plan to limit the high-scoring duo of Matt Frierson and Zane Najdawi, who combined to score 17 points and got off just 15 shots.
"We did a really good job on Frierson," UTC coach Lamont Paris praised. "He's very important for them. Najdawi too. As a team they missed some open looks, three or four that stand out, but those weren't Nadjawi and Frierson.
"In the big moments we were really locked in on which situations were good for those two, and we did a very good job of taking that away."
That included the final three Bulldogs possessions. The Mocs took a 70-69 lead on Easley's confident 3-pointer from the wing with 1:18 to play, then forced a long trey try from Kaiden Rice that was well off with 32 seconds to play.
However, Jerry Johnson made just one of two free throws, and after a miss in the lane by Stallworth, Donovann Toatley made one of two with 10 ticks left. Stallworth was fouled as he crossed midcourt because the Mocs wanted to keep the Bulldogs from getting off a potential tying 3, but he made both shots at the line with six seconds left.
Johnson then split two free throws again, setting up a final play in which Stallworth's good look led to he ball hitting the front rim, then the back rim, then falling off.
"We wanted the ball in Lew's hands," The Citadel coach Duggar Baucom said. "Now, preferably, I would have wanted him to throw it back out because we had three guys set up to win it, but he got a great look.
"Credit Lamont. He's done an amazing job with this program. He's got a completely new team almost, and what he's done in such a short time is amazing."
The Mocs held a 41-32 lead at halftime and extended it to 12 on Jonathan Scott's jump shot in the lane a minute into the second half. They wouldn't score again for more than six minutes as the offense became stagnant.
During that period the Bulldogs scored 11 straight points, pulling within two on a strong Stallworth drive. Easley kept the Mocs in front with six consecutive points, but a Stallworth 3-pointer and a Rice layup put the visitors up 62-58 with less than seven minutes to play.
"I thought we were good offensively early, but we had a rough start to the second half," Paris said. "At one point we got a little bit tentative with our shots, and that's what I didn't want them to do. We wanted to get out of taking early shots, but we went the other way in the second half."
Toatley then ignited the Mocs, hitting a 3-pointer, feeding Easley for a short jumper and then hitting a pair of free throws to put the hosts back up three, setting up the frantic and fortunate - for the Mocs - final minutes.
"Coach knew they were going to throw a lot of defenses at us, so he wanted us to be patient and the shots will come," Easley said. "We really focused on defense and rebounding, and that was key. Just making them shoot rough shots."
Vila added 17 points and two blocked shots, while Toatley again was a spark off the bench with 15 points.
The Mocs hit the road this week with games at SoCon leader Wofford on Thursday and at Furman on Saturday.
Contact Lindsey Young at lyoung@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6296. Follow him on Twitter @youngsports22.