A crowd of 4,105 fans gathered into the ETSU/MSHA Athletics Center on Saturday afternoon to celebrate ETSU’s homecoming and cheer on the Bucs to a 73-60 victory over the Tennessee Tech Golden Eagles.The Bucs were led by senior Mike Smith, who scored a career-high 26 points.

“Mike Smith played like Mike Smith needs to play,” head coach Murry Bartow said.

“We didn’t play well against Murray State,” Mike Smith said. “So I was in the gym getting extra shots up every day this week.”

The Bucs, who only put up 39 points in their last outing against Murray State, played three different zone defenses that seemed to confuse Tech from the beginning.

“Defense has been our trademark this year, last year, the year before that,” senior Micah Williams said.

“We know that if we can’t defend, we aren’t going to win.”

Williams finished the game with 10 points, all coming in the second half.

The senior picked up his scoring when Mike Smith was forced to the sidelines after picking up his fourth foul with 12:10 left in the second half.

Two other Bucs joined their teammates in scoring double figures.

Senior Justin Tubbs finished with 13 points, including an electrifying dunk with 2:35 left in the game.

Junior Isiah Brown finished the game with 10 points, 5 blocks, and 9 rebounds.

The Bucs got off to a slow start, but would take the lead 10-8 with 14:59 left in the first half, and never give it up.

They took a 32-25 lead into halftime.

The Eagles brought it within four points, 58-54 with 5:53 left in the second half, but the Bucs were energized by the crowd and were able to pull away.

Bartow loved the crowd turnout.

“I thought the crowd was great, especially the students,” he said.

“The students are so critical to the energy because they really spark the energy. There is no way as a coach to say ‘well it helped us two points or three points’, but it helps us, because it energizes the players.

“When you’ve got loud students at each end it just energizes the rest of the building. So we desperately need 1,000 students here every game, because it really helps our team win.

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