UCF basketball struggles on road

A two-game skid in Conference USA play hasn’t left the UCF men’s basketball team much worse for the wear, though they’re coming up on a tough end to the regular season. They’ll face two of the top three C-USA teams in the final week.

In the meantime, they get a break after back-to-back drubbings by No. 22 Memphis and UTEP that left them reeling. Feb. 13 the Knights traveled to top-ranked Memphis and fell 93-71 despite four starters shooting in double digits.

Against UTEP, a team that’s been clawing at UCF’s heels all season, it got worse. Narrowly behind the Miners by halftime, the Knights watched a second half that slipped away into oblivion as the Knights shooting collapsed.

The Knights would shoot 32.3 percent for the game, despite four players shooting double-digit scoring. In the second half the Knights attempted 18 wild three-pointers, and sank only three of them.

The Knights’ star center Keith Clanton had a rare off night, nailing only four points to the scoreboard in 31 minutes on the floor, and shooting 7.7 percent in the process, though he totaled nine rebounds in the game. Only one Knights starter shot better than 40 percent in the game — newcomer Daiquan Walker, who hit 43 percent en route to 11 points in the game.

The loss put UTEP (14-10, 7-4) dangerously close to the Knights (17-8, 7-4) on the C-USA ladder, with only a few games left to play in the regular season.

Wednesday night they faced Marshall at press time, and they’ll take on Tulsa (14-11, 6-5) at 4 p.m. Saturday at home. After that they take a rare late-season break from C-USA play to face Georgia Southwestern at home at 7 p.m. Feb. 26 before they launch into a quick final three games against some of the conference’s toughest opponents.