ORLANDO (UCFKnights.com) – The UCF women's basketball team held off a late run to earn a 67-64 win over Temple on Wednesday evening in Addition Financial Arena.
UCF (17-9, 9-5 The American) saw an eight-point lead disappear in the final frame as Temple (15-12, 7-7 The American) made it a 59-59 game with 2:50 left in the quarter. The Knights responded with a five-point swing to reclaim their edge.
A late foul allowed the Owls to trim UCF's advantage to just one, 65-64, with two ticks left on the clock. Kay Kay Wright stepped up to secure the victory for the home team at the charity stripe, sinking both free throws in the final second to give UCF 67-64 final tally.
Neither team was able to gain a large advantage in the contest. UCF scored first and led by as many six before the Owls closed the first quarter on a 9-2 run to lead 15-14 after the first 10 minutes. Temple led by as many as five points in the second quarter but took just a 32-30 advantage into the locker rooms at halftime.
The teams traded leads in the third quarter before UCF put together a 6-1 spurt over the final 80 seconds to take a 49-43 lead into the final frame.
UCF finished with a season-low five turnovers while forcing Temple into 14. The Knights converted those into 19 points and scored 15 points on the fast break.
With the victory, UCF moved back into a tie with Cincinnati and South Florida for second place in the league standings with just two games remaining in the regular season.
Kay Kay Wright entered Wednesday just nine points shy of moving into the top five on UCF's career points chart. She scored nine in the first half to tie Chariya Davis (1995-99) for fifth on the chart. She added 15 in the second half to put her career total at 1,532 points, which ranks fourth all-time at UCF.
The Orlando native is now the only Knight in program history to rank in the top five in career points, assists and steals.
Wright led all scorers with 24 points, shooting 58.8 percent (10-17) from the floor. Masseny Kaba, Sianni Martin and Brittney Smith each finished with nine points for the Black and Gold. Kaba also collected a team-high seven rebounds and had three blocks.
NEXT UP
UCF heads to Memphis for its final regular season road trip. The Knights face the Tigers at 3 p.m. ET on Saturday in Elma Roane Fieldhouse.
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