Tusculum got what the Pioneers wanted in their season opener Monday night, a challenge and a win.

Tennessee Wesleyan made the Pioneers work for the victory with a big second half, breaking open a close first 20 minutes to pull away 81-64 winners.

"It was kind of what we expected," said Pioneer coach Jim Boone. "We knew Tennessee Wesleyan would be a challenge for us. They are a good team. They have some really good parts to their team. They are very well coached. I knew it was going to be a challenge and a struggle with it being our season opener."

The Bulldogs (0-3) gave the Pioneers all they wanted at the start. It was a tie game with three minutes remaining in the opening half until Rob Troutman sparked Tusculum on a short run that helped the Pioneers take a 34-31 lead into the break.

The second half was completely different.

Kyle Moore took over for the Pioneers, scoring 23 of his game-leading 29 points to push Tusculum clear for the win.

"I don't want to say it was first game jitters. We knew what they had and we've prepared for them. We just had to settle down on offense," Moore said. "At times we were shooting the first open shot we got, and that is not Tusculum basketball. We have to work deep into the shot clock to make our opponent defend. We did that in the second half."

Tusculum shot nearly 60 percent from the floor in the second half.

Boone was pleased with not only how well Tusculum shot the ball but how well the Pioneers worked their shots. Tusculum hit 27 field goals, and 24 of them were assisted.

Josh Bennett and Jimmy Boone both scored 18 for Tusculum. Moore had nine assists.

Wes Taylor led the Pioneers on the boards with 15, 11 of them on the defensive end to limit the Bulldogs' second chances.

The Bulldogs were led by 15 points from Matt Towry.

Tennessee Wesleyan's defense created some problems for the Pioneers. The Bulldogs forced 21 Tusculum turnovers. E'Jay Ward had six steals.

Boone said you can't point to a single cause of not holding onto the basketball better.

"It's about a lot of different things," he said. "It's about playing against a press for the first time. It's about the first game. It's about working some guys in that haven't played as many minutes. It's about just not making some intelligent plays that we have to do a better job with."

Boone knows the Pioneers (1-0) will have to do a better job this weekend when they travel to play in the Lions Club Classic in Kentucky where they face Christian Brothers on Friday in the opening round.