Memphis @ Central Florida preview

Last Meeting ( Mar 15, 2019 ) Memphis 79, Central Florida 55

Memphis dropped out of the top 25 for the first time all season after back-to-back losses to Tulsa (80-40) and SMU (74-70). Now the Tigers look to get back on track and end their skid Wednesday as they head to Orlando to face a Central Florida team that has rebounded from a five-game slide with victories in two of the last three contests.

"Whether it's in practice or games, I know our guys are going to compete," Knights coach Johnny Dawkins told reporters after a hard-fought 87-79 loss at Wichita State on Saturday. "I think they showed it again tonight." UCF showed resilience against the Shockers despite being undermanned as the team, already without forward Dre Fuller Jr. (groin) and Ibrahim Famouke Doumbia (illness), was further depleted when top frontcourt players Collin Smith and Avery Diggs were in foul trouble early, resulting in Smith, the team's leading scorer, managing just two points in 15 minutes of play while the team was outrebounded 45-28. The Tigers' downfall in their most recent loss to SMU was their inability to put the ball in the hoop down the stretch as Penny Hardaway's troops were held without a bucket in the final six minutes to turn an 11-point lead into a four-point loss. "Honestly, this game is really hard to believe," Hardaway said afterward. "In the last six to seven minutes, you see that we went from being a team that wasn't turning the ball over and playing pretty good defense to a team that started turning the ball over and playing poor defense. It's hard to believe that we couldn't score and we couldn't stop them. We put ourselves in position to lose a very tough game that we should have won at home."

TIME: 7 p.m. ET. TV: ESPNU

ABOUT MEMPHIS (14-5, 3-3 AAC): Freshman forward D.J. Jeffries topped the Tigers in scoring with 18 points against SMU, with leading scorer Precious Achiuwa (15.1 points per game) right behind with 15 and guard Boogie Ellis chipping in with 14 after only managing three points in the four previous games combined. The team wound up shooting 49.1 percent from the floor to rebound from a dismal 28.6 percent effort in the 80-40 loss at Tulsa the game before. The defense didn't show up, however, against SMU as the Mustangs nailed 62.5 percent of their shots in the second half to shred a Memphis defense that entered the game ranked first in the country in field-goal percentage defense (35.7 percent).

ABOUT UCF (11-8, 2-5): With the Knights short on big men against Wichita State, Dawkins went with a smaller five-guard lineup, with freshmen Darin Green Jr. and Tony Johnson Jr. coming off the bench to score a team-high 18 and 16 points, respectively, as each hit 4-of-8 3-pointers. For the third time this season, five Knights wound up reaching double digits as the two freshmen were joined by Ceasar DeJesus (16 points), who has scored in double figures in 10 of the last 12 games, Dazon Ingram (11) and Brandon Mahan (10). The Knights only turned the ball over seven times in the loss, just the second time this season they had less than 10.

BUZZER BEATERS

1. UCF has won six of the last eight meetings, but Memphis earned a 79-55 victory in the quarterfinals of last season's American Athletic Conference Tournament after the teams split the regular-season series with each winning on its home court.

2. Memphis is a perfect 11-0 when it holds an opponent to 64 points or fewer but just 3-5 when opponents score more than 64.

3. The Knights are 8-0 when leading with two minutes left and 9-1 when leading with five minutes to play.

PREDICTION: Memphis 67, UCF 63