2025-26 Chattanooga Basketball
Postgame Notes & Quotes
Southern Conference Championships
Opening Round vs. #9 The Citadel – March 6, 2026
 
Site: Harrah's Cherokee Center – Asheville (Asheville, N.C.)
Game Duration: 1:54
Officials: Chris Ford, Evan Berg, Art Vaulk
Attendance: N/A
 
Quick Records
Chattanooga: 13-19
The Citadel: 11-21

Series History
Meeting: 99th | UTC leads 76-23 (H: 41-7; A: 33-15; N: 2-1)
*UTC is now 2-1 all-time against The Citadel in SoCon Tournament games.

Dan Earl, Head Coach
Overall (11th): 154-196
at Chattanooga (4th): 81-57
vs. The Citadel: 14-10
SoCon Tournament (at UTC): 5-4
 
Historical Records
All-Time Program Record: 1,467-1,172
Division I Era (since 1977-78): 921-603
All-Time SoCon Tournament Record: 65-37
 
General Team & Matchup Notes

• Chattanooga finishes the 2025-26 season 13-19 overall after falling to The Citadel 88-85 in the SoCon Tournament opening round… The Citadel advances to the quarterfinals and improves to 11-21.
• Chattanooga's eighth appearance in the SoCon Tournament opening round stage… now 5-3 in first round games… format began in 1993… first time dropping a first round contest since 2013.
• Chattanooga entered 65-37 all-time in the Southern Conference Tournament… 20 finals appearances and 12 titles are both league bests.

 
Inside the Game & Player Notables

• The two teams combined for 21 lead changes and seven ties during a very back-and-forth contest… UTC led for 18:21 while The Citadel held a lead for 17:35… 4:04 of game time saw a tie score… most lead changes in a game all season.
• Chattanooga finished the game shooting 55.9% (33-of-59 FG) from the floor… fourth time over shooting north of 50% from the floor in the past five games… now 39-4 under Dan Earl (since 2022) in games shooting better than 50%.
• Chattanooga scored 80+ points for the fifth consecutive game… went just 3-2 in those five games… finished 8-2 this season when scoring 80+… now 52-7 under Dan Earl in such cases.
• Chattanooga and The Citadel entered the halftime break tied at 49-49… fourth time in last five games scoring 40+ in the first half… the two teams combined to make 17 threes in the opening half… teams combined to shoot 35-of-62 FG (56.5%) from the floor in total… 17-of-32 (53.1%) from deep.
• G Tate Darner knocked down four threes in the opening half… second one was his 51^st 3FGM of the season… new UTC single-season freshman record… surpassed Kevin Easley's 50 in 2019… finished with 16 points and eight rebounds… season-high rebound total.
• G Jordan Frison posted 16 points (7-14 FG; 2-4 3FG) and added a season-high nine assists… only one turnover… nine assists are most since Frank Champion's nine against Western Carolina on 2/19/2025.

 
Postgame Quotes
Dan Earl, Head Coach
Opening statement after first round loss to The Citadel.
"Obviously, a very difficult game. Credit to The Citadel, they played really hard. They had a couple of guys step up and make shots in particular, Keynan Davis and Sola Adebisi. So give them a ton of credit on that. It was unfortunate we couldn't get stops. So it was kind of, you know, the last minute of the game was kind of like a microcosm of our season, freezer line blockout, then we couldn't grab an offensive rebound, couldn't get stops down the stretch. So it's hard. This thing comes to an end really quickly as you know, and I want to thank our seniors for giving everything they did." 
 
Overall summary of the season.
"We had some injuries that really threw us for a loop, really hurt us for the rebounding situation. But also, the puzzle pieces kind of didn't fit, and that's on me. So I apologize, we will be due to work our tails off. To the Chattanooga faithful, they were loud there tonight again. I appreciate them immensely. And I feel bad for our guys because they worked hard. Just things didn't come together this year for a variety of different ways. So certainly a challenging year. We will look in the mirror and figure out how to get better for next year."
 
Collin Mulholland, F-So.
Reflecting on the drastic difference of the past two seasons.
"I guess I didn't appreciate it (The NIT Championship run) at the time. because that was sort of my first year of playing college basketball. So this year, ending this much earlier, is like really makes me reflect a little more. Then I guess this year it's just like stay together because even though we're not going to be playing basketball with this exact group anymore, you know, we're all still friends, we'll also stay in contact."
 
Jordan Frison, G-Jr.
On his one season thus far at Chattanooga.
"You know we really love each other and we were connected. This was definitely the most connected team I have been on in my college career. It was just fun coming in everyday and being with the guys."