ASHEVILLE, N.C. (Mar. 8, 2025) – The 2024-25 season, full of highlights and legendary players, came to an end two days too early.
ETSU men’s basketball fell to Wofford 72-60 on Saturday at the Harrah’s Cherokee Center in Asheville, North Carolina, in the 2025 SoCon Men’s Basketball Championship quarterfinals.
The Buccaneers (19-13) got out to a 9-2 lead with four players hitting early, including Peterson from deep, but the Terriers (17-15) answered with an 8-0 run to jump in front with a three by Justin Bailey.
Seymour gave the Bucs the lead back with 14:09 left with a 10-foot jumper from the right baseline. When Kyler Filewich tied the game at 14 with 10:44 left, Peterson immediately answered with a jumper from the right baseline to get the Bucs back in front, and Johnson extended the lead to 19-14 with three free throws after being fouled beyond the arc. Peterson found Boyd alone on the left block for a layup then drained a three off a screen to give ETSU a 24-10 lead with 6:19 to play in the first half.
The Bucs went on a long drought, over 5:30 without a field goal, and Tripp tied the game at 25 to cap an 11-1 run before Johnson put the Bucs back in front in the final minute of the half. Filewich scored through contact with 1.8 left, but could not hit the free throw, and the half ended with the two teams tied at 27.
Sivills hit a pair of threes in the first minute out of the half to give Wofford its largest lead at 37-29 as part of a 19-3 run across the halftime break. Karon Boyd hit a three – his first make since February 15th – then hit two free throws to cut the lead back to 40-37.
The Bucs trimmed the deficit to two at 45-43, then Peterson hit a right-side three off a scramble to give the Bucs their first lead of the second half with 12:38 to go. Johnson followed up with a three less than 30 seconds later to stretch it to 49-45. Jeremy Lorenz gave the Terriers the lead back with a layup to make it 51-50 with 8:52 to play.
Peterson hit a layup with 6:47 left to cut the lead back to one, then a jumper with 5:32 to play to tie the game at 54, but Justin Bailey converted a four-point play to put Wofford back up 58-54 with 4:57 to go, and Filewich made it a six-point lead with a second-chance layup. Tripp and Khamari Holmes further stretched it to an 11-0 Wofford run to put them up double-digits with 2:31 left, a lead that proved insurmountable for the Bucs.
Peterson finished the game with 22 points, moving him past Major Greer for 30th on ETSU’s career scoring list. Jaden Seymour led the Bucs in his final game at ETSU with seven rebounds and scored four points, finishing 11th on ETSU’s career scoring list with 1,375 points. Boyd had 12 points and four rebounds in 30 minutes.
ETSU ends its season at 19-13, their most wins since the 2019-20 season.
