ORLANDO – The UCF men's basketball team will look to keep its strong start to the season rolling on Saturday as the Knights travel to Coral Gables, Florida for a showdown with Miami. Originally scheduled for 2 p.m., the two staffs mutually agreed to move the game up to 1 p.m. instead.
The game will be streamed live on ACC Network Extra. Fans can also listen live to UCF's broadcast on Twitch.com here. Austin Lyon will be on the call.
The Knights are in year six under head coach Johnny Dawkins, who led his squad to an 11-12 record in 2020-21, including an 8-10 record in AAC play. The Knights made it to the quarterfinals of the American Athletic Conference tournament before falling to Memphis.
For Miami, the Hurricanes are in year 11 under head coach Jim Larranaga, who is 201-130 in his career with the Canes. Larranaga led his team to a 10-17 record in 2020-21 and were 4-15 against ACC opponents. Saturday's game will be the first matchup between Miami and UCF since Nov. 12, 2019, when UCF lost, 79-70, in Orlando. The Knights are 2-8 all-time against the Hurricanes.
Game Information
Date: Saturday, Nov. 13
Time: 1 p.m. ET
TV: ACC Network Extra
Radio: Twitch
SETTING THE SCENE
• The UCF men's basketball team returned to action by winning its 2021-22 season opener, 69- 59, over Robert Morris on Wednesday in front of 4,869 fans at Addition Financial Arena.
• UCF wasted no time establishing itself—allowing the firrst basket of the night to Robert Morris and then going on a 14-2 run while hitting four of its first six three-point attempts (two each by Darius Perry and Darin Green Jr.).
• UCF connected on 53 percent of its first-half shot attempts (five of 13 from deep)—while its defensive pressure forced eight Robert Morris turnovers and limited the Colonials to 10-of-36 shooting (27.8 percent)
• Perry led the Charge with 18 points and a highlight reel dunk while big man Cheikh Mbacke Diong tied his career high with five blocked shots and contributed seven rebounds.
BACK AT THE OLD STOMPING GROUNDS
• Knights' assistant coach Kevin Norris makes his return to his Alma Mater as he was a four-year standout at the University of Miami from 1994-98.
• Norris played point guard for the Hurricanes and is one of the most accomplished players in program history as he still holds the record for steals (208) and consecutive starts (108) to this day.
• Norris ranks second all-time at Miami in assists (493) and fourth in total starts (108).
• The 1994-95 BIG EAST All-Rookie Team honoree is the only player in program history to lead Miami in assists four years in a row.
DAWKINS ERA AT UCF
• Johnny Dawkins has made an immediate impact as head coach for the UCF men's basketball team, winning 95 games in six years at the helm.
• Dawkins is 95-60 since starting with the Knights in 2016, a win percentage of .613, the second best of any UCF coach (Torchy Clark, .754 from 1969-83).
• He has the third most wins over any UCF coach, trailing Clark's 274 and Kirk Speraw's 247 from 1993-2010.
• Dawkins has led UCF to its first NIT Final Four (2017), first at-large berth to the NCAA Tournament (2019) and first NCAA Tournament win (2019).
• Prior to Dawkins' arrival at UCF, the program had won three games against ranked opponents from 1984-2016. Since Dawkins has taken over, the Knights have won five games against ranked opponents.
• UCF had never won two games against ranked teams in a single season, and the Knights did it in a span of five days, taking down no. 6 Houston and no. 19 Cincinnati late in the 2018-19 season.
• UCF is now 8-49 all-O me against ranked opponents, but 5-15 against ranked teams under Dawkins.
WHO IS BACK?
• The Knights are among the leaders in the country with 97 percent of their points scored and 96 percent of their minutes played from the 2020-21 season returning for the upcoming season.
• Key returners suiting up for the black and gold again this season include Darius Perry, Brandon Mahan, Isaiah Adams, Darin Green Jr., Dre Fuller Jr., C.J. Walker, Jamille Reynolds and Sean Mobley.
• Each one of those players saw over 250 minutes of action for UCF last season
WHO IS NEW?
• Immediately eligible transfer Cheickh Mbacke Diong is a redshirt senior forward who comes to
UCF from UNLV, where he served as a team captain last season. Last season with the Rebels, the 6-foot-11 Diong averaged 8.9 points and 7.4 rebounds per game, while shooting 60.7 percent from the field. He also had 27 blocks, 33 steals and 20 assists in 2020-21.
• Diong is a native of Dakar, Senegal - the home of Tacko Fall and assistant coach Mamadou N'Diaye.
• Next, there are a pair of true freshman guards in Darius Johnson and P.J. Edwards. Johnson, the son of UCF Men's Basketball Director of Player Development Kelvin Johnson, was a four-star recruit by both Rivals and ESPN out of Episcopal High School in Virginia.
• Edwards is a 6-foot-4 combo guard originally out of Springfield, Illinois. He was rated as a three-star recruit by Rivals and was ranked as high as the 17th-best player out of the state of North Carolina when head coach Johnny Dawkins signed him at the beginning of 2021.
• A 6-foot-9 forward out of Dallas, Texas, Ed'Xavier Rhodes is a 6-foot-9 forward who was rated as a three-star recruit by Rivals and was ranked as one of the top power forwards in the class when head coach Johnny Dawkins signed him back in April 2021. He averaged 20 points, nine rebounds, and 2.5 blocks per game last season at Skyline High School in Dallas.
• Finally, JUCO transfer Tyem Freeman was named a National Junior College Association of America first-team All-American as a freshman at Indian Hills Community College in 2020-21. The 6-foot-6 guard was the only freshman to earn the accolade as he averaged 18.1 points per game and 7.3 rebounds per contest while shooting 52.2 percent from the field. He joins the Knights as a sophomore, but technically has four years of eligibility remaining due to the COVID-19 extra year.
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