Mocs Adjusting Without Injured 7-Foot Star Jake Stephens

Chattanooga-(WDEF-TV)

What a bummer for Mocs 7-footer Jake Stephens.
He was enjoying a fantastic season.
One of the best big men in the country.
And now he’s hurt.
Stephens has a hand injury that forced him to miss the ETSU game last Saturday, and it’s hard to forecast when he might return.

Hard seeing Jake Stephens in street clothes at practice, and sadly it could be awhile before he’s back in action.
Said head coach Dan Earl:”It’ll be a little bit of an extended period of time. Certainly Jake did not practice today. I don’t know that he will practice tomorrow or anything like that. Of course just thinking about Jake first and foremost. He came back to college to accomplish a bunch of things. It’s been a tough set-back for him.”
I mean Stephens was leading the Southern Conference in scoring and rebounding.
Said guard A.J. Caldwell:”You lose one of the top players in the whole country. You’re almost scrambling what can I do. It’s a little bit of an adjustment I think for everybody, so we’re just trying to find our ways.”
Losing an accomplished 7-footer from your lineup will certainly force Chattanooga to switch things up.
Said Earl:”Certainly you do have to change some things. In some ways maybe you play. You shoot some more three’s or maybe press a little bit more. Play faster. All these things going on.”
It’s a tough blow not having Stephens on the floor, but the games go on.
Said Earl:”Went down the line. Are you a good, Southern Conference basketball player, and almost to a man it’s like, yeah I can play. It’s like okay, you’ve got to step up and play and play even better right?”
Said Caldwell:”I have a lot of confidence in myself and everybody else on this team that we can still be really good team with the guys that we have.”

Mocs host Wofford on Wednesday night hoping to stop a three game losing streak.