Basketball team travels north of the border
Jeremy Acree
Issue date: 9/10/09 Section: Sports
The UTC basketball team traveled to unfamiliar territory over the weekend.
That is no metaphor for how they played or what the results were.
The Mocs took a preseason trip to Toronto, Canada for the Labor Day holiday, playing four games against Canadian colleges in hopes to get some extra preparation for a team that lost six seniors last year.
The Mocs are coming off a trip to the NCAA Tournament and a Southern Conference Championship, but of all the returning players, only Jeremy Saffore, a junior from Nashville, and Ty Patterson, a senior transfer from Anderson, S.C., started a game for the Mocs last year.
Patterson did not make the trip due to a recent academic suspension handed down by Coach John Shulman. Patterson will also miss the first eight games of the regular season because of the suspension, but will be eligible to play again if he improves academically after finals which end Dec. 12.
For those that did travel north of the border, it was about more than just basketball. Shulman urged to the team that winning was not everything this weekend and that he hoped to just see chemistry build.
Among the highlights were a trip to a Toronto Blue Jays baseball game against the New York Yankees, as well as looking out from atop the CN tower - the world's second largest building.
A couple of the players blogged about the trip on gomocs.com.
"My experience in Toronto, Canada this past weekend is one that I think I will never forget," Ridge McKeither, a junior transfer from Danville, Va., said in the blog. "This weekend was not only for us to bond as a team, but it was to become more of a family."
The first game was played Saturday afternoon at the University of Toronto, where the Mocs fell 85-70 to the host team.
Junior Deantre Jefferson, Bloomington, Ill., led the team with 16 points and 10 rebounds, but Shulman tried a variety of lineups, giving only sophomore Keegan Bell, Hazel Green, Ala., and Taylor more than 21 minutes on the floor.
That evening the team recovered, though, posting a 78-71 win over York University.
Sunday was tourism day for the Mocs.
They spent the day at the baseball game and around Toronto, before playing the University of Guelph that evening.
The Mocs fell 74-64 to Guelph despite 19 points from Taylor.
The loss to Guelph was redeemed Monday when the Mocs finished the weekend with a 99-69 win over Sheridan College.
Taylor posted a game high 29 points, and Jefferson added 17 for the Mocs.
That is no metaphor for how they played or what the results were.
The Mocs took a preseason trip to Toronto, Canada for the Labor Day holiday, playing four games against Canadian colleges in hopes to get some extra preparation for a team that lost six seniors last year.
The Mocs are coming off a trip to the NCAA Tournament and a Southern Conference Championship, but of all the returning players, only Jeremy Saffore, a junior from Nashville, and Ty Patterson, a senior transfer from Anderson, S.C., started a game for the Mocs last year.
Patterson did not make the trip due to a recent academic suspension handed down by Coach John Shulman. Patterson will also miss the first eight games of the regular season because of the suspension, but will be eligible to play again if he improves academically after finals which end Dec. 12.
For those that did travel north of the border, it was about more than just basketball. Shulman urged to the team that winning was not everything this weekend and that he hoped to just see chemistry build.
Among the highlights were a trip to a Toronto Blue Jays baseball game against the New York Yankees, as well as looking out from atop the CN tower - the world's second largest building.
A couple of the players blogged about the trip on gomocs.com.
"My experience in Toronto, Canada this past weekend is one that I think I will never forget," Ridge McKeither, a junior transfer from Danville, Va., said in the blog. "This weekend was not only for us to bond as a team, but it was to become more of a family."
The first game was played Saturday afternoon at the University of Toronto, where the Mocs fell 85-70 to the host team.
Junior Deantre Jefferson, Bloomington, Ill., led the team with 16 points and 10 rebounds, but Shulman tried a variety of lineups, giving only sophomore Keegan Bell, Hazel Green, Ala., and Taylor more than 21 minutes on the floor.
That evening the team recovered, though, posting a 78-71 win over York University.
Sunday was tourism day for the Mocs.
They spent the day at the baseball game and around Toronto, before playing the University of Guelph that evening.
The Mocs fell 74-64 to Guelph despite 19 points from Taylor.
The loss to Guelph was redeemed Monday when the Mocs finished the weekend with a 99-69 win over Sheridan College.
Taylor posted a game high 29 points, and Jefferson added 17 for the Mocs.
