The Thursday GoMocs.com Top 10 Moments series continues today with No. 8. Check out the countdown here with
No. 9 and
No. 10.
No. 8 focuses on "the gauntlet". One of the craziest runs in sports, the seven-games-in-15-day stretch the squad endured to open February.
It opened with a hard-fought road triumph before returning home for a record-setting win. Then it got serious. Over a five-day period, this first-place Chattanooga crew squared off with the second-place team in the SoCon twice with a third team just a half-game back well in the race. A loss on the road was followed by a third win over a second-place team.
No doubt the seeds for this scene were planted January 30-February 13.
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A
63-56 win at Samford got the ball rolling. It was not a pretty win, but one that highlighted the Mocs moxie. It was a defensive effort on a night when shots weren't falling as
Tre' McLean's first career double-double (12 pts/10 reb) led the way.
The offense bounced back in a big way two nights later. It generated a school-record-tying 125 points in
40-point victory over The Citadel. The margin of victory was the largest in a league game in our 39 seasons in the SoCon.
Then the belly of the beast appeared. Three-games-in-five days hosting Wofford, Furman and then traveling to Mercer. Oh, by the way, all three would be in the thick of the SoCon race in second-place, or half-game out in Wofford's case, behind the good guys in the standings.
A great defensive effort pulled off a
79-63 win over Wofford. It was the 20th win on the season as McLean (21) and
Justin Tuoyo (20) each tallied 20 as the Mocs built a lead, saw the Terriers fight back and then extended it again only to do it all over again. Lather, rinse, repeat.
Tuoyo had the exclamation point with 3:42 to go a nice feed from
Greg Pryor as they pulled away in the end.
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Next up was the lone team to put a blemish on the season to that point, the Furman Paladins. Fourth game in a week. Not surprisingly, heavy legs led to an off night offensively, so it was on the defense's shoulders, and what broad shoulders those were.
What happens when you lose a 10-point deficit late in a pivotal conference game? You gut it out for a
62-54 win. Leading by 10, Furman scored seven straight to cut it to three. The Roundhouse went into lockdown mode keyed by this defensive play by McLean on Paladin leader Stephen Croone just inside 20 seconds remaining.
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On to Macon for a game against an emotional Mercer squad. Timely buckets and defensive stops carried the day in the
72-66 overtime win.
Eric Robertson led four in double digits with 20 points including a six-of-seven night beyond the arc. He hit his first five attempts in the first half. But his sixth was the biggest.
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A largely forgettable game at Western Carolina followed. It was a Catamounts team finding its stride that carried it all the way to a SoCon semifinal loss to your Mocs, but that's a story for another day. Much like the first league loss at Furman, the team was sort of unrecognizable in a
67-61 loss.
From there it was on to Johnson City and a date with rival ETSU. The seventh game in 15 days. The loss in Cullowhee bringing whispers of doubt about a tired Mocs platoon marching into enemy territory.
They took the lead for good on a
Dee Oldham 3pt at 9:13 of the first half. It reached its zenith of 16 less than 20 minutes later "3-Rob's" triple with 10:57 to go. It never got closer than seven. McLean posted his first "20 & 10" night with 25 points and 11 rebounds as well as tying his career high of four steals. It was a dominant effort at an important time.
So how do you sum up a two-week period like that?
Yep, it was quite a run. Resiliency is an excellent word for what the Mocs displayed. You could say this is when the squad put its "championship stamp" on the season.
