GREENEVILLE, Tenn. — Senior Connor Jordan scored a game-high 25 points in his final contest at Pioneer Arena as the Tusculum men’s basketball team defeated visiting UVA Wise 83-75 Wednesday night in South Atlantic Conference men’s basketball action.
It was the final home game for TU seniors Cade Huff, Kobe Funderburk, Jacob Hobbs, KJ Crump and Jordan.
With the victory, the Pioneers (13-12, 11-8 SAC) clinch a berth for next week’s SAC Tournament, which will be held March 5-8 in Rock Hill, South Carolina. TU remains in a tie for fifth place in the league standings with Saturday’s regular-season finale at Anderson to determine the final bracket seeding.
Redshirt freshman Bryce Jackson accounted for 17 points, five rebounds and four assists for Tusculum. Crump finished with a dozen markers, while Funderburk tallied 10 points including a pair of three-pointers.
UVA Wise (10-17, 6-13 SAC) was led by Joe’l Pettiford’s team-high 24 points and nine rebounds as he shot a blistering 10-of-13 from the field. Lav Cvetkovic’ added 19 points and four assists, while Carmelo Pacheco and Ben Bryson tallied 16 and 11 points, respectively for the Highland Cavaliers.
Tusculum led 40-38 at the half and later used a 14-2 run to take its largest lead of the night at 65-50 with 7:55 remaining as Crump completed a three-point play.
The Cavs scored six straight including a pair of baskets by Pettiford as UVA Wise trailed 65-56 with 6:38 to go. Tusculum pushed the advantage back out to double figures but the Cavs went on a 9-2 spurt and trimmed the once 15-point deficit down to four (72-68) after back-to-back triples by Pettiford, then Bryson with 3:22 on the clock.
Jackson scored the next five points for the Pioneers including his three-point play with 2:35 left to extend the lead to 77-68 with 2:35 remaining.
But UVA Wise would not go away as Cvetkovic’ hit a running jumper in the lane, then made two free throws with 1:24 on the scoreboard as the Cavs trailed 77-73.
On TU’s next possession, Jackson missed an off-balanced shot, but he came up the rebound and tipped the ball in with 56 seconds remaining.
UVA Wise came up empty on its next trip down the court as the Pioneers hauled in the rebound and Jordan was fouled. He would make his two charity tosses with 41.2 seconds left to put the game out of reach.
Tusculum shot 50.8 percent from the floor and went 9-of-22 from three-point territory (40.9%), while the Cavs shot 46 percent including 7-of-18 from downtown (39%). TU forced 13 Wise turnovers resulting in 21 points. TU also scored 23 fast break points and the Pioneer bench outscored the Cavs reserves by a 36-3 margin.
TU caps another winning month of February as the Pioneers went 5-2. Tusculum also posted another winning campaign at home were TU went 9-4 at Pioneer Arena. Wednesday was also TU’s 198th win at home since moving into Pioneer Arena during the 1997-1998 season.
The Pioneers’ trip to Anderson will be a rematch of last December’s SAC opener where TU edged the Trojans 80-75 in Greeneville. In Tusculum’s last trip to the Electric City, the Pioneers came away with a 97-94 double-overtime victory last February.
