With one game left at home in the Bucs’ regular season against Western Carolina, the Bucs looked to honor the teams only senior James Harrison (Dallas, Texas).
“It’s meant the world to me playing at ETSU,” said Harrison. “When you want to win you will do anything to win, so being supportive and bringing energy, anything I have to do I’m going to do.”
Harrison has been an asset to the team’s bench points the last four years, but on Saturday he made his first career start as a Buc.
“I was happy to get him in there and get us off to a good start,” said Steve Forbes.
The game was critical, as it would determine where the Bucs sit in the SoCon tournament coming up this weekend.
Both teams started the first half pretty even offensively. For the Bucs, they found success shooting from three early.
With under four minutes to play, Tray Boyd III (Memphis, Tennessee) hit his second three of the game giving the Bucs a 30-27 lead. However, the Bucs’ struggles from the free throw line were no different than games passed as they made two of their eight attempts in the first half.
In the last five seconds, Isaiah Tisdale (Lexington, Kentucky) made a layup in transition to give the Bucs a 34-31 lead at the half.
Tisdale led the Bucs in scoring at the half with 10 points, converting on four of his five shot attempts. He also provided two three-pointers.
As a team, the Bucs’ offense was efficient making 58 percent of their shots. Defensively, the Bucs held Western Carolina to 40 percent shooting from the field goal before halftime.
After the start of the second half with under 11 minutes to play, the Bucs took a two point lead.
With five minutes remaining the Bucs offense started to get separation, taking a seven point lead.
The Bucs went on to win 81-74, led by a big shooting night from Boyd III finishing with 24 points.
Due to Furman winning their game as well, the Bucs will go into the conference tournament Saturday as the No. 4 seed facing No. 5 seed UTC.
The Bucs wrapped up regular season play with a record of 23-8 and 13-5 in conference play. Going into the tournament free throws and consistently being able to hit the open three will be questions the Bucs must answer in order to advance to the next round.
