UCF has been a surprise to many this season, but not just in the state of Florida.
Coming off it’s first ever ranking in school history, No. 24 UCF gained even more notoriety in the national media on Thursday, as they were given the No. 24 spot in ESPN.com’s College Basketball Power Rankings.
Numerous ESPN.com’s senior college basketball writers compile the poll, including Jay Bilas, Pat Forde, Dick Vitale and Andy Katz. The rankings say UCF “has stormed out of the gate under former Florida assistant Donnie Jones. The Knights have wins over the Gators and Miami so far this season.”
The highest UCF was ranked by any senior writer was Dick Vitale, who put the Knights in the No. 16 spot in his poll.
UCF is coming off a 64-59 win over UMass on Wednesday, helping them improve to 11-0 on the season, their best start in school history since moving to Division I in the 1984-85 season.
The Knights are the only team from the state of Florida in the rankings, despite the No. 20 Gators being ranked ahead of them in the AP Top 25 poll. UCF is not the only team from Conference USA in the rankings, as the 9-1 Memphis Tigers are four spots ahead of them at No. 20.
UCF has two more non-conference games left on their schedule before they begin Conference USA play as they face Furman and either Northeastern or Princeton in the UCF Holiday Classic presented by EA Sports, which kicks off next Wednesday at 7 p.m. at the UCF Arena.
MJ-like attention
Marcus Jordan has been getting a lot of attention these last couple of days, and it’s not just because he carries his father’s famous name.
Many major media outlets have been doing stories on Jordan, including the Boston Globe, FoxSports.com and Yahoo! Sports.
- Stan Grossfeld of the Boston Globe wrote about Jordan’s continued improvement in leading UCF.
- Jeff Goodman of FoxSports.com detailed Jordan’s plea to play Wednesday at UMass and how he’s making a name for himself.
- Yahoo! Sports’s Jason King wrote about Jordan leading the Knights and his path to UCF.
Check out the music video KnightNews.com worked with Bezz Believe to produce to highlight UCF’s success:
httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g98-Zj0Mjfs
And don’t forget to stick with KnightNews.com for continuing coverage of UCF athletics. The next big game for the Knight Nation is against the Georgia Bulldogs in the Liberty Bowl.
