Hurricanes Hold Off Central Florida, 62-51
Dec 27, 2002
ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) – Forward James Jones scored 14 points and snared sevenrebounds Friday to lead the University of Miami to a 62-51 win over theUniversity of Central Florida.
The Hurricanes improved to 5-4 and got a career-high 11 points from pointguard Paulo Coelho, who started for the first time this season.
Freshman guards Armondo Surratt and Robert Hite were kept out of thestarting lineup for arriving late for a team meeting. Both played, however, andHite scored 10 points in his 24 minutes of action.
UCF was led by Ray Abellard with 12 points and Dexter Lyons with 10. TheKnights dropped to 7-4 on the season.
The teams played mostly dead even in the first half until Miami ran off ninestraight points, capped by a Gary Hamilton layup that put the Hurricanes up29-20 with 3:18 left in the half. UCF responded with a 7-0 run that Lyonsstarted with a three-pointer and Roberto Morentin finished with a free throw toclose to 29-27.
Miami led 31-29 at halftime and UCF drew even at 32-32 early in the secondhalf on another free throw by Morentin, but the Golden Knights never pushedahead. Darius Rice’s only basket of the game gave Miami a 34-32 lead with 17:11to go.
The Hurricanes pushed the advantage to 55-44 as UCF bogged down under aseries of turnovers. The Golden Knights had 14 turnovers in the second half, 25for the game.
Miami turned back the last rally from UCF by hitting seven of eight freethrows in the final minute. Coelho hit four of those free throws and was fiveof six from the line on the night.
