Mocs 75, Georgia Southern 66

First the bad news.

The Mocs were terrible. They were outrebounded by Georgia Southern, the 321st ranked rebounding team in the country. The Mocs collected just two offensive rebounds.

The Mocs turned the ball over nineteen times.

They allowed Georgia Southern to shoot 54.9% from the floor, including 50% from three point range.

For the third consecutive game, the Mocs built up a lead over 15 points, and watched it get whittled away down to almost nothing.

Now the good news.

The Mocs forced twenty turnovers from Georgia Southern, and those turnovers lead to 25 points.

The Mocs shot 59.1% from the floor, including 63.2% from three point range.

The Mocs had 21 assists on 26 made baskets.

And the won.

In the end, there's not much else to say. The Mocs found a way to come up with the win yet again. And there never seemed to really be any doubt about it. I know the lead got trimmed to three late, but there was never really any doubt.

Omar Wattad and Ricky Taylor lead the way with 19 points. Chris Early scored 13, including five big ones in the final two minutes. Keegan Bell finished with 12 points and nine assists, and just three turnovers.

Bell is one of the top point guards in the conference. He leads the conference in assists and assist-to-turnover ratio. This guy doesn't get nearly enough credit for all that he has done to lead the Mocs this year.

Taylor is also really turning into a great scorer. I said earlier in the year that Taylor was turning into my favorite player on this team (along with DeAntre Jefferson), and here over the last couple of weeks, he has really earned that title. He has simply been brilliant lately. He's got to keep it up.

Now comes the stretch that defines the season. These next seven games are TOUGH. These three conference road games (Davidson, Western Carolina, and Appalachian State) will define how these Mocs are remembered, possibly. If they win two games on this road trip, they will likely be division champs.

Down to two more wins in a row from officially clinching the division. Down to 5-2 from accomplishing my preseason goals of getting to 17 D1 wins.

To reach those goals, they have to play better defense. That is an absolute must for this team. I'm not sure if they are capable of it or not, because they have not shown it recently. Got to find a way to play better defense over this stretch.

GO MOCS!