William Lee Sets School Record in Victory over UTEP

Thursday, January 25

Bartow Arena

7:00 PM

UAB

14-7, 5-3

UTEP

7-13, 2-6

UTEP

UAB

William Lee Sets School Record in Victory over UTEP

1/25/2018 10:26:00 PM | Men's Basketball

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BIRMINGHAM, Ala. – On a night when William Lee broke a long-standing school record, teammate Lewis Sullivan also grabbed a share of the spotlight. Lee put his name firmly into the UAB record books with the 267^th block of his college career, but it was Sullivan who shook out of a recent scoring slump to lead the way in an 85-78 Blazer victory over UTEP at Bartow Arena.

First things first.

Lee entered the game just one block shy of tying Alan Ogg's school record of 266 blocked shots, set from 1986 to 1990. Lee tied the mark with just two minutes and 55 seconds elapsed on the clock. His next one – the record setter – didn't come until there was 1:02 left in the game. He hustled out to the corner and swatted Kobe Magee's 3-point attempt out of bounds.

"It's a great feeling, an amazing feeling, one that I'll probably remember for the rest of my life," said Lee. "Really, I didn't think I was going to get it tonight. I just made a great effort to go out and contest a 3-point shot and got the second block I needed to get the record. It's going to be a feeling with me the rest of my life."

UAB head coach Robert Ehsan was asked afterward for his feelings about Lee setting the record.

"HaHa, because of who he is, being from Alabama and I think he has the high school record, sometimes we take it for granted how special of a record it is," Ehsan said. "It's a unique record. Obviously, shot blocking is not like rebounding, where every year you have a good rebounder. It's an amazing record. Alan Ogg's record has stood for how long? HaHa's record could stand for another 25 years, easily. It's good it happened tonight. He was anxious, he wanted it to happen."

Now Lee has more time to build on the record and make it even tougher to surpass.

Everyone knew that Lee had a good chance to break the record tonight. For Sullivan, though, no one knew exactly when he would bust out of his scoring slump. The 6-foot-7 junior is capable of providing instant offense, but he had scored just 25 points combined in the Blazers' first seven Conference games.

On Thursday, Sullivan was unstoppable in his 20 minutes on the floor for the Blazers (14-7 overall, 5-3 C-USA). Sullivan scored a season-best 19 points. He was 7-of-8 from the field and 5-of-6 from the free throw line. He also added four rebounds, two assists with just one turnover.

"It's super important for us," said UAB guard Nate Darling, who had 17 points, hit all four of his 3-point attempts and was 6-for-6 overall from the field. "He's kind of our energizer bunny. Every time he scored, if you looked at the bench, we were going crazy. For him to get going, it really brings us all up and we play to our best potential."

In the first half, it was Jalen Perry coming off the bench and energizing the Blazers on a night when there wasn't much energy in the building. Perry contributed eight points and five rebounds in 14 first-half minutes to help the Blazers get past an early deficit and take a 41-36 advantage into halftime.

Lee and Chris Cokley scored inside the paint in the first 90 seconds of the second half, forcing UTEP head coach Phil Johnson to call a quick timeout. It didn't slow down UAB's momentum. UTEP (7-13 overall, 2-6 C-USA) scored out of the timeout but UAB responded with a dunk by Cokley and five consecutive points by Darling, including a 3-pointer, to build a 52-38 advantage.

That set the tone for a second half that featured UAB building comfortable margins and UTEP slowly chipping away. UTEP trimmed the deficit to 65-60 with 9:15 left but UAB responded with a 7-2 run over the next four minutes to build the lead back to 10 points. Cokley started it with a layup and Sullivan had the final four points of the run.

"Give our guys credit, we never let it get closer than five or six," said Ehsan, whose team outscored UTEP, 48-20, in the paint. "When we did need a basket, we went to Chris or Lewis inside and usually got something, which is obviously our strength."

UAB finished with six players in double digits for the first time this season. Cokley had 15 points and 11 rebounds, Zack Bryant had 12 points, Perry finished with 10 points and Lee had 10 points and five rebounds.

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