ORLANDO – The UCF men's basketball team is gearing up to play its final home game of the season as the Knights (16-9, 8-7 AAC) welcome Cincinnati (17-10, 7-7 AAC) to Addition Financial Arena on Wednesday, Feb. 23 for a 9:00 p.m. tip, presented by First Watch.
The Knights will honor their six seniors (Darius Perry, Levy Renaud, Brandon Mahan, Dre Fuller Jr., Cheikh Mbacke Diong and Ryan Anders) ahead of the game, which will air live on ESPNU, with Marc Daniels also on the call on FM 96.9 The Game.
UCF is coming off a nail-biter as the Knights won at the buzzer Sunday to take down ECU 69-66.
Junior Darin Green Jr., who hit the game-winning shot after receiving the ball with less than three seconds on the clock, led the way with 19 points on 5-of-11 threes. Senior Darius Perry added 12 points, and sophomore Ty Freeman had 11 off the bench. C.J. Walker scored nine points, while freshman Darius Johnson had eight points and a team-high eight rebounds and inbounded the ball on the winning play.
Cincinnati, meanwhile, has enjoyed a solid year to this point under first-year head coach Wes Miller. The Bearcats enter Wednesday night's game at seventh place in The American, one spot behind the Knights. Miller is tied for 10th among 57 head coaches at new schools this season (as of Monday).
The Bearcats are led by the duo of David DeJulius and Jeremiah Davenport, who combined account for nearly 40 percent of their scoring. DeJulius leads the way with 14.7 points per game while the 6-foor-7 Davenport is averaging 13.8 as well as a team-high 5.3 rebounds per game.
Cincinnati holds the all-time series lead at 13-4, including a 6-3 record in Orlando. The two sides split the two meetings last year as the Bearcats fell 75-70 in Orlando before getting revenge with a 69-68 win in Cincinnati.
Game Information
Date: Wednesday, Feb. 23
Time: 9 p.m. ET
TV: ESPNU
Radio: FM 96.9 The Game
DAWKINS ERA AT UCF
- Johnny Dawkins picked up career win No. 100 in the Knights' win over N.C. A&T on Dec. 11, becoming just the third coach in UCF history to reach the milestone.
- Dawkins is 110-68 since starting with the Knights in 2016, a win percentage of .615, the second best of any UCF coach (Torchy Clark, .754 from 1969-83).
- He has the third most wins over any UCF coach, trailing only Clark's 274 and Kirk Speraw's 247 from 1993-2010.
- Dawkins is the fastest coach to reach 100 wins in program history in the Division I era, needing only 162 games to do so.
- Dawkins had his squad off to a 4-0 start to begin the 2021-22 season, tying his 2017-18 mark for his best start to a season at UCF.
- 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 8-52 all-time against ranked opponents, but 5-18 against ranked teams under Dawkins.
THE QUEST FOR 1,000
- Fifth-year senior point guard Darius Perry scored his 1,000th career point in UCF's win over Wichita State on Feb. 8.
- UCF fifth-year senior Brandon Mahan is the next Knight in line to reach 1,000 if he is able to do so this season (926 career points).
- Junior Darin Green Jr. (884) and fifth-year senior Cheikh Mbacke Diong (905) are also closing in on the career milestone.
SO LONG, SENIORS
- The Knights will honor their six senior players (as well as their two graduate managers and four student managers) ahead of the game agains the Bearcats Wednesday night.
- The game will mark the final regualr season home appearance for Darius Perry, Brandon Mahan, Dre Fuller Jr., Cheikh Mbacke Diong, Levy Renaud and Ryan Anders.
- UCF's seniors have accounted for 45 percent of all scoring and the same percentage of minutes played for the Knights this season.
- Senior Darius Perry currently leads all Knights with 109 assists.
- Senior Cheikh Mbacke Diong leads the team with 146 rebounds and 36 blocks.
- Entering Wednedsay, three of the Knights' top five scorers are seniors (Perry, Mahan and Diong).
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