Feb. 23, 2002

Final Stats

Chattanooga, Tenn. - Cory Largent registered a double-double and Casey Rogers moved to fourth on the Southern Conference career assist list, but it was not enough to lift Western Carolina to a win, falling 91-71 to Chattanooga Saturday night at Mckenzie Arena.

Western Carolina (12-15, 6-10 SoCon) will play Furman its first round game of the 2002 Southern Conference Championship on Thursday (Feb. 28) at 6:00 pm in the North Charleston Coliseum. The Cats enter the tournament at the fourth seed out of the SoCon North. Chattanooga (16-13, 9-7 SoCon) ends the regular season in a tie for first it the SoCon South and will face the winner of UNC Greensboro and Wofford on Friday.

The four Chattanooga basketball seniors combined for 63 to lead the Mocs' to the win tonight. Toot Young and Neil Ashby led the way with 24 and 21 points respectively. Young added eight rebounds and seven steals, while Ashby, the league's top shot blocker, turned away seven Catamounts field goal attempts.

A layup by UTC senior Clyde McCully at 12:15 of the first half gave UTC the lead for good at 13-12. His bucket started a 16-2 spurt that extended the margin to 27-14 at the eight-minute mark. A 13-3 burst, capped by one of Toot Young's six 3-pointers, gave the Mocs their largest lead of the half at 40-21 with 4:40 left in the half.

The Cats trimmed the deficit to 44-33 at halftime and got as close as eight, 44-36, on a Kevin Martin dunk with 19:10 remaining. The Mocs scored 11 of the next 14 points to increase the advantage to 55-39 at 15:43. A 14-2 UTC blitz, capped by Dusty Pullian's first career 3-pointer with 5:18 to play, gave the Mocs their largest lead of 84-57.

Largent, who moves to 14th on the WCU scoring list, scored 15 points and tied a career-high with 12 rebounds, pulling down 11 on the defensive end. Rogers, who had a season-high 12 asssists, moved pass App State's Tyson Patterson for fourth on the league's career list. Rogers now has 640 assists for his career.

Martin led WCU with 27 points. The freshman added seven rebounds as well.

McCully led Chattanooga in rebounds with a career-best nine. He also netted 11 points and had six assists. Tim Parker canned 4-of-7 triples to score 16 points.

Tickets for the 2002 Southern Conference Championship may be obtained online through the www.catamountsports.com, or by calling the WCU ticket office at (828) 227-7338.