Mocs now tied for SoCon lead

The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga women’s basketball team moved into a tie for first place in the Southern Conference with a 60-55 win Saturday at Samford.

Raven Thompson finished with 23 points in 27 minutes of game action, while Yazz Wazeerud-Din added 13 points as the Mocs improved to 15-10 overall and 7-3 in the league, matching Wofford (17-7 overall), which comes to McKenzie Arena next Saturday.

First, though, the Mocs will host Furman (10-15, 2-8) at 7 p.m. Thursday.

UTC started slowly at Samford (13-13, 7-4), as the Bulldogs shot 73% (8-for-11) while holding the Mocs to 23% (3-of-13) in the first 10 minutes to build a 19-9 advantage. The Mocs responded in the second quarter with an 11-0 run highlighted by 3s from Wazeerud-Din, Brooklyn Crouch and Addie Porter, but the Bulldogs still held a onepoint lead at halftime.

Samford led 44-42 after three quarters before the Mocs used a 15-3 run to take control, helping the visitors hold off a late Bulldogs run that cut the margin to three points with 43 seconds remaining. Porter hit a pair of free throws in the last six seconds for the final margin, and UTC won for the third straight game and the fifth time in its past six.

“We talked about having the opportunity to get into first place this weekend — it was in our hands and we had to grab it,” UTC coach Shawn Poppie said on the postgame radio broadcast. “We grabbed it, now we’ve got to squeeze, right?”

Porter finished with eight points and a team-high eight rebounds, while Abbey Cornelius had seven points and six rebounds. Sigrun Olafsdottir chipped in six points and five rebounds as the Mocs avenged a 58-53 home loss to Samford on Jan. 12.