Dec. 2, 2010
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By John Denton
UCFAthletics.com
ORLANDO, Fla. (UCFAthletics.com) - In the final seconds of UCF's landscape-changing defeat of the University of Florida on Wednesday courtside cameras at Amway Center flashed an image of UCF athletics director Keith Tribble smiling broadly and confidently pumping his fist.
For Tribble, the biggest victory in school history - possibly in any sport ever at UCF - was confirmation that the Knights are dramatically on the rise in basketball and have absolutely the right leader in first-year coach Donnie Jones.
``It's huge for us winning this game,'' said Tribble, who had an ear-to-ear smile splashed across his face as he exited UCF's locker room Wednesday night. ``For us to play well and win versus a very good Florida basketball team that has won NCAA championships and is going to be in the NCAAs this year proves that our team believes and expects to win. Then, we went out and did it and it's great for our program.''
UCF improved to 6-0 for the first time since the 2006-07 season and beat a ranked team for just the second time in school history. And the Knights finally broke through against Florida - Tribble's alma mater - after 10 tries.
The victory was also especially sweet for Jones, who beat his former coaching boss in Billy Donovan. Jones served as an assistant coach at Florida under Donovan for 11 seasons before leaving for the Marshall head coaching job. Jones returned to the Sunshine State to coach at UCF last March partially at the urging of Donovan, a man he considers his coaching mentor.
Jones admitted after vanquishing Donovan and the Gators that he was emotional over the magnitude of the moment.
``I almost feel humbled to be around (Donovan) and you almost feel guilty that you won,'' Jones said. ``Right from the beginning, Billy was telling me how proud he was of me and that I deserved to win. He told me three times, so he about had me cry at half court. It was a great victory.''
When Jones was hired, Tribble liked that Jones exuded confidence and charisma out of practically every pore and that he would be bringing an exciting, up-tempo style of play to the program.
Wednesday's win, Tribble said, just confirmed that he hired the right coach to take UCF's basketball program to levels never before reached. And another sign of that climb could come on Monday when the Associated Press and USA Today polls are released and the Knights could be receiving votes for only the third time in school history.
``No question about it, Donnie is the right guy for our program,'' Tribble said. ``I just knew with his pedigree from learning from Billy Donovan and Donnie being a guy who is a winner that he'd be successful."
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John Denton's Knights Insider appears on UCFAthletics.com several times a week. E-mail John at jdenton@athletics.ucf.edu.