After a devastating second half collapse last Wednesday at Rice, in which the UCF men’s basketball team (19-8, 8-5 C-USA) squandered a 12-point halftime lead, the Knights will look to rebound Saturday night against UTEP (14-13, 7-6 C-USA) at the UCF Arena.
The Knights were outscored 46-25 in the final half, and lost a crucial late-season game that all but eliminated them from receiving an at-large bid from the NCAA Tournament.
Keith Clanton led the Knights with 18 points and seven rebounds, but only had two second-half points in the defeat.
“We gotta make sure we play a better second half. We had a good first half, offensively, but we didn’t play at the level we needed to in the second,” UCF head coach Donnie Jones said at Thursday’s practice. “We didn’t lose with our offense, we lost with our defense. We did a poor job guarding the basketball. We didn’t do a good job down the stretch.”
UCF will likely need to win the Conference-USA Tournament if they are going to have an opportunity to make an appearance in the Big Dance.
And if they want to secure a top four seed in the league tournament, they can start by getting a victory tonight against the Miners.
UTEP is one of the hottest teams in C-USA currently, having won four straight games, with three of them coming against the league’s top four teams (Memphis, Southern Miss and Tulsa).
“We fell a little short Wednesday, but we gotta regroup here and get ready for a very good UTEP team that’s probably playing as well as anybody in our conference. They’ve had some great wins… they’re a young team that’s growing up, and playing with a lot of confidence right now,” Jones said.
If the Knights are going to cool down the Miners, they are going need more production out of junior guard Marcus Jordan.
Jordan continued his recent slump, posting only four points on one-of-five shooting, along with three turnovers against the Owls. However, he was able to facilitate, dishing out six assists. UCF will need his scoring ability against a solid UTEP defense that ranks fifth in the conference in points allowed at 63.3 per game.
“Well he’s a focal point on everyone’s scouting report. They talk about him and Keith- those guys have been the two-headed monster. I think our team’s gotten better because we have more than two guys that can play, and he (Jordan) deferred the last couple games, passing up some shots,” Jones said.
“He had six assists the last game…He hasn’t really had a lot of good looks, so he’s gotta continue to be aggressive, hopefully tomorrow he needs to score for us. He’s been okay in just winning.”
The Knights will also need to cut down on the turnovers after having 18 miscues on Wednesday that was a large reason for the loss.
If UCF can stick to their game plan, get offensive production from Jordan, play through Clanton in the paint, as well as play solid defense, they shouldn’t have too much of an issues taking out the Miners on their home floor, where they are 14-1 this season.
“I feel like we just have to come out and play hard and play at our potential. In the second half at Rice, we didn’t play at our potential. In the first half we did, so I feel like if we play a full game, we can win it,” Clanton said.
The Knights will look to record their second consecutive 20-win season tonight, and put themselves in good position to make moves in the upcoming C-USA Tournament.
“We just want to win. We’re focused, we’re still playing for something. Our goals are still ahead of us, and we can still achieve our goals, so we just want to come out hard and play with intensity,” Clanton said.
