ORLANDO – UCF (14-4, 5-1) totally dismantled the USF (6-11, 0-6) basketball team with surgical dominance Tuesday night, but it was only the show-within-the-show as the Knight’s 86-64 victory took a backseat to a scorching performance from Matt Williams.
Williams ran the show on the floor all night, sinking 11-of-21 three-point attempts to notch both the conference and school single-game record for shots made from behind the arc.
“Our guys played really well tonight, I give them a lot of credit…. And what about Matt?” said Head Coach Johnny Dawkins. “He had one of those magical nights.”
“What I really loved about it was that the people that were happiest for him were his teammates.”
I thought they did a good job of finding him and looking for him when they knew he had it going.
He totaled 38 points on the night, a career high.
“Once I kept shooting I saw the basket, I felt like the basket was starting to get getting bigger and bigger. I just kept letting it go,” said Williams.
No kidding. He let it fly 23 times in a game when no other teammate had more than eight attempts. A whopping 21 of those came from three-point range.
The 21 attempts were a conference record as well, affording Williams every opportunity to set the mark, shattering his previous career-high of seven three-pointers. His teammates fed him all night, never ceasing to stoke the fire of the historic run.
“I think when anybody gets going like that – especially a shooter like that – you’ve got to get him the ball. Matt’s one of the best shooters in the country, so you know we believe in him more than I think he believes in himself,” said A.J. Davis on the performance.
UCF’s win over the Bulls broke a 15-15 tie in the total battle count for the War on I4, improving to 5-1 in conference play.
