UCF holds on against UAB on the road, 48-41

Resiliency has been a recurring theme for the UCF Knights (15-4, 5-1) this season, and was once again Saturday afternoon, as they defeated the UAB Blazers (6-12, 1-4 C-USA) for the first time in school history, 48-41.

In a low-scoring road contest the Knights curtailed the Blazers' shooting to 28 percent on the game.

"It just shows the toughness of our team and how we've made strides to be able to find ways [to win]," coach Donnie Jones said afterward during his radio interview on the UCF IMG Sports Network. "We've put in two to three stops in a row now [defensively] in the last minutes [of the game]."

Junior forward Keith Clanton, the hero from Wednesday's historic win over Memphis, also had another clutch play in the final minutes Saturday, as he banked in a 9-foot jump shot. He led the Knights with 10 points and blocked three shots.

"I told the guys at timeout, we're going to space out the floor, run some action, and try to get the ball in more," Jones said. "We were able to get to Keith, our post-player, to be able to make the bucket."

Clanton swatted an important shot to give UCF the edge for an extra possession around the one-minute mark of the game, where they led by three points.

More notably however, Clanton has climbed up the ranks in UCF history and is currently the number one shot-blocker of all time.

Junior guard Marcus Jordan had a quiet offensive game, scoring nine points, but hustled for a team-high eight rebounds instead.

In terms of efficiency, sophomore guard Isaiah Sykes shot 57-percent from the field. He scored eight points, but was plagued by foul trouble.

The Knights started the game off by going on a 12-0 run, showing no hangover from Wednesday's emotional win.

"I thought we were very poised," Jones said. "I thought we worked the ball, we got good shots, and I thought we did a good job defensively."

UCF led by as much as 14 points and ended the first half leading 24-15.

"I feel like we still had control of the game," Clanton said. "We let up a little and we know we have to fight up for next time."

UAB found some momentum and claimed their first lead in the game at the 6:14 mark of the second half as sophomore swingman Jordan Swing sunk two of his two free throws.

Coach Jones immediately called for a crucial timeout to regroup the Knights.

"We didn't give up." Clanton said. "We had to make a defensive stop and every time we try to take it one possession at a time, then we came up and made [that stop]."

From there onwards, sophomore forward Tristan Spurlock stole one of UAB's possessions and buried a 3-pointer around the four-minute mark to push UCF's lead back to one. It opened up a 9-0 run for the Knights, which helped them clinch the victory.

Spurlock grabbed seven rebounds while senior forward P.J. Gaynor hauled in five rebounds himself.

Senior point guard A.J. Rompza dished out four assists and stole the ball five times in 35 minutes of action.

The team missed junior center Josh Crittle for majority of the game as he was elbowed in the face and had blurry vision according to Jones. He will return to the starting lineup for next Wednesday's road game against Tulsa.

"We just have to come out and play our own game," Clanton said about the upcoming game against Tulsa. "The environment is going to be different, we're not going to have [our] fans, of course, [but] we're going to have to come out to play aggressive and hard."