Hunter Dickinson says KU’s ‘character will be tested’ after heartbreaker vs. Houston

Just three days after playing 45 minutes in Kansas’ 92-86 double-overtime loss to Houston, Hunter Dickinson will be back in Allen Fieldhouse on Tuesday night for a Big 12 battle against UCF, a team that will have revenge on its mind after losing to KU by 51 points on Jan. 5 in Orlando, Florida.

“It’s tough. Playing the minutes we played out there … I don’t think I’ve ever played that many before in a game,” Dickinson, a 7-foot-2, 265-pound senior from Alexandria, Virginia said Saturday night after KU’s second loss at home during the 2024-25 Big 12 season.

“It’ll be tough on the body (but) there are no excuses anymore,” added Dickinson, who scored 17 points and grabbed eight boards against the Cougars. “Nobody’s going to care about how many minutes we played. We’ve got to come out with energy and aggression and try to make up for what we just did.”

The Jayhawks squandered late six-point leads in both regulation and the first overtime in falling to Houston.

Other Jayhawks who played mega-minutes versus the Cougars and could experience fatigue in the 7 p.m. rematch (ESPN+) against the Knights: Dajuan Harris, 45 minutes; Zeke Mayo, 44 minutes and Flory Bidunga, 36 minutes.

“I think our character will be tested a lot in these next couple days after this because obviously it’s heartbreaking and that kind of was the mood in the locker room. It was just kind of shock of what just happened up six with I think 16 seconds left or something like that,” Dickinson said of moving on after an exhausting loss.

“It’s a crushing loss and you’ve got to find a way to get it out of your mind. We’ve got a hungry UCF team coming in here on Tuesday that is going to try to take advantage of us being down, but it’s in the past now. We can’t focus too much on it. You can’t get it back.”

The Knights, who are coming off an 85-58 blowout victory at home over TCU, enter with a 13-6 overall record, 4-4 in the league. UCF just a week and a half ago dropped a 69-68 decision to Houston in a near-upset played in Orlando.

That’s right: UCF lost to KU by 51 and Houston by one.

No. 11-ranked KU is one game ahead of UCF in the league standings at 5-3 and 14-5 overall. KU actually improved a spot in this week’s poll after beating TCU on the road and losing to undefeated league foe Houston at home.

“Coach (Bill Self) said to keep our head high because we fought,” Dickinson said. “We battled.”

Self noted that it will be difficult for the players to bounce back so quickly after a crushing defeat.

“It’s probably as hard a defeat as I can remember ever having here during a regular season game,” Self said. “We’ve had some tough ones, but that was probably the hardest one because we won the game twice.

“We’ve got to show some mettle (vs. UCF). This will reveal our character in how we can bounce back. We certainly need to stick together.”

Self said during film sessions he would “show things we can correct. We’ve got to move forward. The thing is if people think this is the frickin’ end of the season because we are in late January, I mean it’s not at all. We showed (against Houston) we can play with arguably as good a team as there is in America without one of our best players (the injured KJ Adams). There’s some good things that took place but obviously some critical situations in carrying out assignments late we’ve got to be better at.

“I’ve got to come up with some ways to try to help our guys more because certainly we could have used that there late.”

In the first meeting between KU and UCF, Dickinson scored 27 points on 12-of-17 shooting with nine rebounds. Rylan Griffen had 14 points, Bidunga 12, AJ Storr and Harris 11 apiece.

Keyshawn Hall was the only Knights player to score in double figures with 12 points on 4-of-17 shooting.

Hall, a 6-7 junior, averages 17.2 points a game on 43.1% shooting. He’s made 25 of 72 3s for 34.7%. Hall scored 40 points at Arizona State in a 95-89 win on Jan. 14 in Tempe, Arizona. He became the third player in UCF history to score 40 in a game

“We have to fight back after a game that didn’t end the way we wanted,” freshman Bidunga noted.

Self would like to see some improvement in the offense.

“We played so slow,” he said of the Houston game. “Whenever we went to the bench, our ball and body movement was just terrible. I don’t know how we practice it more but we’ve got to. We are so stagnant. There are things we can correct that cost us.”

Self added: “When Flory or Hunt came out of the game we had no offense at all. That was disappointing. We didn’t help or cover for Flory and Hunt because we were stable and stagnant. Flory was good (19 points, seven rebounds). He got touches around the rim. He got a lot of points in part because Hunter got a lot of attention.”

Tuesday’s game will be televised on ESPN+. Former KU guard Jerod Haase is scheduled to work the game as color commentator.