UTC women’s coach Shawn Poppie frustrated by lapses in loss to Western Carolina | Chattanooga Times Free Press

UTC women’s coach Shawn Poppie frustrated by lapses in loss to Western Carolina

Staff file photo by Olivia Ross / Yazz Wazeerud-Din led UTC with 11 points in a 56-48 loss to Western Carolina in SoCon play Saturday at McKenzie Arena.

Thursday night at McKenzie Arena, the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga women's basketball team put together perhaps its best performance of the season in a 67-46 win over UNC Greensboro.

Saturday afternoon on the same court, it was very much the opposite of a good performance for UTC.

Western Carolina, which entered the game as statistically the worst shooting team in the Southern Conference, had its best offensive showing of the season against one of the best defenses in the league in a 56-48 victory. The visitors kept the Mocs from what would have been their first three-game winning streak since a four-game run in late November.

The Catamounts (9-13, 2-5) shot 60% from the field against UTC, and they were almost as good from 3-point range, going 5-for-10. Their previous high this season was 47% overall shooting against NAIA member Montreat on Dec. 11, and their best against a Division I team was 45% versus Presbyterian on Nov. 15.

Saturday's shooting success helped Western Carolina overcome 30 turnovers and win for just the seventh time in 45 all-time trips to McKenzie Arena.

"Today is frustrating because it's been this group," first-year UTC coach Shawn Poppie said. "I just told the team after the game that they're scared to be great. What I mean by that is once we get to that point where we can really kind of get this thing rolling, we're scared of that moment and then we look for somebody else to do it, and we've just got to keep being us.

"We're not talented enough just to show up, and that was the message in the locker room. We've talked about how we're going to handle success, and we showed up today and looked for everybody else to try to do it, and we're not talented enough to do that."

Western Carolina's Kyla Allison had game highs of 20 points and seven rebounds — the Catamounts beat the Mocs 33-14 on the glass — and Mya Love scored 11.

The Mocs' forced turnovers helped them hang around in the game as they turned those into 20 points, but the offense became stagnant far too much to mount a serious run. UTC shot just 35% from the field, and too many times passed up open looks early in the shot clock that led to forced attempts later on.

Yazz Wazeerud-Din was UTC's only scorer in double figures, and the 5-foot-11 guard's 11 points came on 3-of-16 shooting from the field, including 2-for-10 from 3-point range. Fellow senior Abbey Cornelius was 4-for-7 for eight points, and third-year player Sigrun Olafsdottir had a career-high six steals to account for half of UTC's total.

Poppie, a Virginia Tech assistant for six seasons before coming to UTC, is a defensive coach. But with a month left in the regular season, he could be nearing a time where he has to potentially sacrifice some defense for an offensive playmaker. He specifically mentioned sophomore guard Destiny McClendon, who has played in only 12 games this year, as a potential target should he decide to make the change, but he also admitted "it's a culture thing" when it comes his hesitancy to change too much.

"It's what I want to try to build," Poppie said. "I'm OK with losing games as long as you come out to practice and show that you're trying to do what we ask. My point is that if that core group that we've relied on does stuff like today, maybe I need to throw (McClendon) out there, because they're not doing what they're supposed to do, either.

"Maybe we need to throw some more offense out there in hopes that we can get enough stops. But it's a culture thing, and I think once you give up on your culture to win some games, what does this turn into for year two, year three, year four? So I've been stubborn because of that because I want to make sure that this is what we stand by moving forward."

The Mocs (12-10, 4-3) host East Tennessee State (17-6, 4-3) at 2 p.m. next Saturday.

Compiled by Gene Henley. Contact him at ghenley@timesfreepress.com.