WHITE SULPHUR SPRINGS, W.Va. – The UCF men’s basketball team suffered its first loss of the 2024-25 campaign, falling to No. 19/25 Wisconsin 86-70 in the opener of the inaugural Greenbrier Tip-Off.
“We didn't make shots but, you know, give them credit. They did a good job of defending us and they made it tough for us,” said head coach Johnny Dawkins. “We have to do better offensively; we have to space the floor better. We have to balance our offense between our perimeter and our bigs. Those are things that we didn't do consistently throughout the night.”
Shots weren’t falling for either side early, as it was just 6-4 four minutes into the game with buckets from Jordan Ivy-Curry and Rokas Jocius. From there, the Badgers built a quick 11-point edge thanks to a 13-4 run over the next four minutes, making it 19-8. Wisconsin continued to put pressure on the UCF defense, driving the lane and scoring in the paint.
“I thought we got out of sync almost right away,” said Dawkins. “They hit some shots and they had us kind of scrambling defensively, had us spread out a little bit, we blew a couple of assignments and that kind of snowballed into the offense. I think we tried to get it all back at once.”
The Knights found themselves down 22 points with 4:06 left in the first half. UCF began to creep back after technical and shooting fouls were called on Wisconsin on a Ivy-Curry drive to the basket. The fifth-year guard hit three-of-four from the line as the Knights found themselves down 18 with 2:37 left in the opening frame. Ivy-Curry and JJ Taylor put an additional four points on the board before the halftime buzzer sounded as UCF entered the halftime locker room down 15 at 46-31.
The Knights came up empty on nine three-point attempts in the first along with shooting 29.4%. UCF had two assists to Wisconsin’s 12. The Badgers shot an even 50% heading into the break.
Dallan ‘Deebo’ Coleman sunk a pair of free throws 16 seconds into the second half to bring UCF back to within 13. However, six straight missed shots by the Knights left the door open for Wisconsin to build onto their lead, ballooning it back to 22 at 61-39 with 14:36 to play.
Despite UCF’s efforts to mount a come-from-behind effort, Wisconsin protected its lead well down the stretch as they had an answer for nearly every basket the Knights made. The Black and Gold put together their best run of the contest with under five minutes to go, stringing together seven consecutive points to cut the deficit to 16 with 2:16 left. The final point differential remained at 16 as UCF suffered its first loss of the season 86-70.
UP NEXT
The Knights will meet LSU in the consolation game of the Greenbrier Tip-Off bracket, tipping off at 3 p.m. on CBS Sports Network. The Tigers fell to Pitt 74-63 in the first game of the day.
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