Certainly there have been bigger wins for Colorado during the Tad Boyle era. Yet few have been as uniquely satisfying.

The Buffaloes shook off nearly two full months of frustration and finally posted the program’s first Big 12 win in nearly 14 years, as the CU men’s basketball team outlasted Central Florida for a 76-63 victory on Saturday at the CU Events Center.

The victory ended CU’s 0-13 start to its return season in the Big 12 and ended the second-longest losing streak in program history.

The Buffs dominated the glass and used decisive runs on either side of halftime to end what also was a run of six consecutive losses at home, the program’s longest home losing streak since the 1985-86 season.

“Really happy for these guys. What we’ve been through the last month and a half, just scratching and clawing, coming up short,” Boyle said.

“These guys have stuck together. They haven’t lost their belief in each other or themselves, which is a testament to them. So it’s nice to see them rewarded. And really, rewarded in a game where we were far from our best. On a scale of one to 10, I think we played at like a six.”

The focal point of Boyle’s assessment likely was his team’s 19 turnovers, which nearly matched the 20 the Buffs committed in the previous two games combined against two of the top defenses in the Big 12, Houston and Kansas.CU also committed a season-high 22 turnovers during a one-point loss at UCF on Jan. 8, and for much of Saturday’s rematch it was a similar story against a Knights defense among the least imposing in the league. Like the previous matchup, the Buffs generally shot well and won the battle on the glass but remained handcuffed by their own giveaways.

By the time Central Florida finished a 13-2 run to take a five-point lead with 1 minute, 57 seconds left in the first half, the Buffs already owned 10 turnovers. CU committed only nine more the rest of the way (including an intentional shot clock violation while running out the clock in the final minute), and the Buffs closed the first half with a 9-2 run to take a 38-36 lead at halftime.

CU added a 9-3 run to start the second half and never trailed the rest of the way.

“To close the half, we turned it (over) a few times. That helped them, and they made some timely shots,” UCF coach Johnny Dawkins said. “To start the second half, I thought we got some pretty good shots. For our guys, and our guys that are capable of knocking down shots, we didn’t hit them and that helped their run, too. They had some good shots in the second half and they were able to knock them down. We had some pretty good looks and we didn’t knocked them down. That’s part of basketball.”

The Buffs outrebounded UCF 52-29, recording their highest rebounding total since grabbing 55 against Oregon at the 2022 Pac-12 tournament. The Buffs also recorded a season-high 16 offensive rebounds, leading to a 17-7 advantage on second chance points. The Knights entered the game averaging 12.4 offensive rebounds in Big 12 play but were limited to eight against the Buffs.

While Andrej Jakimovski paced CU’s offense with 15 points, Assane Diop led the effort on the glass, finishing with a career-high-tying 10 rebounds.

“It definitely feels good. Thirteen losses in a row is not something that you ever want to go through,” Julian Hammond said. “Just getting back on the right track and hopefully we can carry over to Iowa State on Tuesday.”