2023-24 Chattanooga Mocs Men's Basketball
Game 9 – Tennessee Wesleyan
December 10 – McKenzie Arena – Chattanooga, Tenn.
Postgame Quotes
 
Dan Earl, Head Coach
Opening statement following 112-51 victory over Tennessee Wesleyan.
"Overall, I thought it was a good effort from our guys. Nice to see the ball go in the basket a little bit. We've had some tough go of it in the past couple games. I thought we learned a lot about ourselves. One of the biggest things I was proud of, is in the second half, we shot 11-for-15 from three. We're trying to preach to the guys that you have a much better chance of making shots if you take really good shots or shot selection is something that's big. We had some wide open looks in the second half, so I was proud of them for adjusting that versus just kind of taking the first decent, not great look in the first half. Hopefully improvement there. Over finals break, it was nice to get a good win. We've got a tough stretch coming up before Christmas."
 
On importance of a game and effort like today.
"I think it is useful. Certainly with finals week, the guys have a little more on their plate academically. We've hit a tough stretch here, where we lost some games on the road in particular recently, three of the last four, so it's nice for the guys to see the ball go in the basket, have a little success and then see them smiling a little bit. All that good stuff. I don't think all our problems are solved. This is still going to be a process, but again, I hope it gives us a little confidence. I hope that for some guys who haven't shot well, seeing the ball go in the basket again helps to see a little success defensively, get our hands on some balls and bother, disrupt the other team. I hope this will help us going forward."
 
On walk-on Ryan Lopez getting into the game.
"I was happy with Ryan. Nice to have him get in the game. I was giving him a hard time. He could have grabbed a couple more balls that hit his hand, grab it with two and have a couple more steals. He had a nice layup in transition. I think it was good for him to get in the game. He works really hard throughout the week in preparing us for the opposing team. It was nice for him to play so many minutes."
 
On the 26-0 run.
"I think that a little of that, the defense. But then I think again, it comes back to shot selection. At halftime we had a large lead. Sometimes it's tough when you get a lead. There's a little bit of human nature between 'okay, I can go get my points now' that kind of thing. And it's tough to be selfless and just do the right thing all the time when you might be able to score as well. We talked to them about shot selection and I want to say we were four of our first four coming out at half with threes. We do this rating system for threes, like for shots and what a great shot is down to a terrible shot. We would rank them all fives on our category which were all wide open, catch and shoot threes. Hopefully you can teach them a little by saying like 'well, watch film and say look, this is a wide open shot. And by the way it fell it went in it's got a much better chance of going in.' So I think a large portion that was being unselfish in the shot selection."
 
Noah Melson, Fr.-G/F
On the importance of a game like today.
"The ball moving, everybody touching, everybody smiling. You can't ask for more."
 
On the 26-0 run.
"Runs like that usually start on the defensive end, getting steals, pushing in transition and then knocking down threes. Getting stops. You're not gonna hold a team to zeros without getting stops. So defensive side started that for sure."
 
On the importance of the bench play including personal play.
"They definitely gonna need that. You can't play with five people because they're gonna get tired. So we on the bench, we know we got to come in and contribute and do our best to produce. I know how good of a shooter I am, so coming in, just take open looks. I can also play make, too, so making sure I can get my teammates involved and then I've been trying to focus on like defense and getting on the boards more."