Jordan Burks’ corner three, Themus Fulks’ clutch finish push Knights by Utah

UCF didn’t have leading scorer Riley Kugel, and several more key players gutted through injuries, but the Knights walked out of Salt Lake City with a key Big 12 road win.

Behind 24 points from point guard Themus Fulks and a go-ahead corner three from Jordan Burks in the final minute, UCF survived Utah, 73-71, on Saturday night to move to 19-7 overall and 8-6 in the Big 12.

“I told them in the locker room, ‘You found a way,’” head coach Johnny Dawkins told Marc Daniels in the postgame radio interview. “That’s what’s required in this league at this level… everybody’s fighting for something, and you have to be able to come out for 40 minutes and stay focused and play the right way, and I thought we did.”

Walking wounded

Leading scorer Riley Kugel suffered an apparent ankle injury in the final minute of Tuesday’s win vs. TCU, and did not play. Devan Cambridge rolled his ankle in the first half and was clearly limited when he tried to return. Jamichael Stillwell missed last Saturday’s game against West Virginia, then returned to play against TCU, but still isn’t 100 percent. Fulks himself has been playing through a hip pointer.

Aside from the injury aspect, Dawkins told Marc they were conscious of the altitude factor.

“Because of that, we tried to sub liberally, especially in the first half,” Dawkins said. “We got guys in and out so the guys weren’t running for extended periods of time… to get their second wind.”

Even so, the core group logged heavy minutes. Burks played 35, Fulks 36 and Stillwell 31 in a game where UCF shot 53 percent from the floor and needed almost every possession.

Fast start, wild finish

The Knights led by as many as nine in the first half, and had a 41-36 advantage at halftime. They pushed the margin to eight in the second half and still led 59-52 before Utah answered with an 8-0 run to grab its first lead since the opening minutes at 60-59.

From there it turned into a rock fight.

UCF nudged back in front, Utah answered, and the Knights found themselves tied 68-68 with under a minute to play when Dawkins dialed up a late-clock action that ended in the hands of one of his most trusted shooters.

“We were trying to spread the floor a little bit, see if we can’t get something downhill with CJ or either Themus,” Dawkins said. “They were defending it well. And when Chris drove the basketball, he could have forced something there. But instead, he had the wherewithal to make the next play. He understood where his teammate would be, and he found him. And Jordan did what he does.”

Burks buried the corner three with 31 seconds left to put UCF up 71-68, capping a 14-point night on 5-of-11 shooting.

Utah refused to go quietly. The one player UCF couldn’t afford to lose track of, sharpshooter Don McHenry, got free in the opposite corner and was fouled on a three-point attempt. McHenry, who came in averaging 17.3 points and had been part of a Utah backcourt that had combined for 40-plus on 11 different nights this season, calmly knocked down all three free throws to tie it, 71-71.

UCF had no timeout and 13 seconds to work with. Dawkins wanted the ball in Fulks’ hands, knowing Utah still had a foul to give.

“I knew they had a foul to give, and so I just wanted to come down and put some pressure on them right away,” Dawkins said. “Typically, you don’t want to foul a player when he’s going north-south… as long as Themus was coming downhill, I felt pretty good that if they did any kind of fouling, he’d go into the shooting motion, which he did.”

Fulks drove left, anticipated the contact and went right into his upward motion as the whistle blew. Utah argued the foul was on the floor, but officials ruled Fulks in the act of shooting. The fifth-year guard, dealing with that nagging hip, calmly sank both free throws for a 73-71 lead with 3.7 seconds left.

Utah, out of timeouts, advanced the ball to three-quarters court, where James Okonkwo hit Terrence Brown at the top of the wing. Brown — who entered the night averaging 20.2 points and ranking among the Big 12’s top scorers — got a clean look just inside the arc, but his potential game-tying jumper rimmed out as the Knights exhaled.

“What are you going to do? Are you going to stand up and fight back, or are you going to let them continue with that momentum?” Dawkins said of those final minutes. “I thought we stood strong… we were able to regain the lead and keep it.”

Fulks carries the load

With Kugel out and other veteran scorers limited, Dawkins needed Fulks to be more than just a pass-first floor general. UCF’s assist king delivered one of his most aggressive offensive performances of the season, finishing with 24 points on 11-of-24 shooting, four assists and just four turnovers in nearly 36 minutes.

“I needed him to do exactly what he did,” Dawkins said. “I needed him to be aggressive, take up some of the slack… guys that are coming in that can contribute, like a Chris Johnson, like a Carmelo (Pacheco), like a George Beale, they haven’t been in these situations as many times as he has, so I needed him to set the tone aggressively, and I thought he did.”

Fulks found an early rhythm attacking the lane, helping UCF build that first-half cushion, then kept hunting his shot when Utah’s defense sold out on shooters. Even while hunting buckets, he still orchestrated enough of the half-court offense to help UCF finish with 15 assists (Themus himself had four) against just nine turnovers and a 52.6 percent field-goal clip.

Supporting cast steps up

Burks’ 14 points included the shot of the night, but he wasn’t alone. Chris Johnson, thrust into more ball-handling responsibility with Kugel out, quietly turned in one of his best Big 12 performances with eight points on 3-of-4 shooting, five assists and no turnovers in 22 minutes.

Stillwell, limited by his ankle, still found ways to impact the game. The senior forward finished with six points on a perfect 3-for-3 from the field, five rebounds and three assists, giving UCF some much-needed interior toughness against a Utah front line that featured 6-9 double-double machine Keanu Dawes and 6-10 Okonkwo.

Off the bench, Carmelo Pacheco knocked down a pair of threes for six points, and 7-footer John Bol added four points, six rebounds and two blocks as UCF finished with a 44-36 edge in points in the paint despite being narrowly out-rebounded, 29-28.

Cambridge gutted out seven points in just 13 minutes before the ankle forced him to the sideline for most of the night. Jeremy Foumena and George Beale each chipped in two points.

Surviving Brown, McHenry and the Utes

Utah may be sitting near the bottom of the Big 12 standings, but Alex Jensen’s first Utes team came in with one of the league’s most explosive perimeter duos. Brown, a 20-point-per-game scorer, and McHenry, a 17-point-per-game guard who takes care of the ball and rarely fouls, had already combined for 40-plus points in 11 games this season.

They were as advertised on Saturday. Brown finished with 21 points on 9-of-15 shooting, while McHenry added 19 points and four threes. Dawes posted a 15-point, 12-rebound double-double and Utah shot 49.1 percent overall and 34.8 percent from three.

But each time Utah threatened to seize full control — whether it was the 10-0 second-half burst that momentarily flipped the scoreboard or the final possession at the horn — UCF managed to get just enough resistance.

“Just the overall toughness. Our fight,” Dawkins said. “When they made a run… that kind of tells who you are a little bit. What are you going to do?… I thought we stood strong, and we got some stops when we needed them.”

Big 12 and NCAA picture

The victory nudges UCF to 8-6 in the Big 12 and 19-7 overall, improving the Knights’ road record to 4-4 and adding another away win to a résumé that already included four Quad 1 victories and a top-50 NET ranking entering the weekend.

In a league where home teams had combined for a 66-38 record in conference play and eight teams were sitting above .500 in the Big 12 standings prior to Saturday’s action, any road win is gold, especially for a program chasing a NCAA Tournament berth in the nation’s toughest conference.

Bracketologists had UCF slotted in the 9–10 seed range earlier in the week, noting a “wins above bubble” score north of 2.0 and one of just 35 Division I profiles with at least four Quad 1 wins.

The Knights plan to remain in Salt Lake City until Monday, before heading 40 miles south to Provo in advance of Tuesday’s showdown at BYU, which entered the week ranked No. 23 in the AP poll and 19-7 overall, 7-6 in league play (awaiting the result of their late Saturday game vs. No. 6 Iowa State). UCF-BYU will be a late one on the East Coast with an 11 p.m. EST tip on ESPN2.

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