Kansas State dropped a nailbiter to UCF on Wednesday night, 80-76.

The loss marks K-State's fourth-straight loss and third consecutive on the road. The loss pushes them to 13-15 overall and 7-10 in Big 12 play.

Here is everything notable Jerome Tang and players said following the game.

On his message to the team...

"We got to be better. We're not good enough to take plays off. We lost the middle 8 today. The 10-0 run to the end the first half, 6-2 run to start the second half. It's a 14-point swing

I love our guys toughness, grittiness, we keep coming back to fight and stuff. At some point in time, we got to not have to fight. Just fight at the beginning and you don't have to worry about the come back.

You guys know me. Normally, I walk in here, say I take the blame for it and stuff. We all have to take ownership of this one and moving forward because it doesn't get any easier. We're in the second best league in America this year, but over the last seven years, it's been the best league in America, and that's what we signed up for.

I told them, as 12 year olds, they dreamt of playing in games like this. They'd watch TV and go, 'Man, I want to be out there.' So now, we have to be sick and tired of it and then make the change."

On Buddy Rich getting playing time tonight...

"It was good. Buddy's grown up. The great part of my job, but it's also the part of my job that probably gets questioned the most, is the opportunity to help these young men grow as men.

There's no business in the world where you get paid before you work, and that's what you have to teach these guys. You got to work.

Nae'Qwan Tomlin ... he just told me, he said, 'Man, I've learned how important it is. How hard it is.'

There's no easy way, life's not easy. Buddy's doing some growing up, and I'm proud of him. And I was proud of his effort today and being ready. I should have played him last game, He's responding the right way, and now he needs to respond the right way to this."

On the problems UCF center Mustapha Thiam gave K-State...

"He had an impact because he was out there, but we wanted him to be a scorer. We wanted him to be the person they were throwing the ball to and being aggressive because that played in our favor. We didn't want [Keyshawn] Hall and [Darius] Johnson doing it.

He's a talent, obviously. He's a talent and he's going to be a very good basketball player. Very, very impressed with his skill level. Late in the game, when he stepped to the line and hit those two free throws. There was no doubt those things were going in when they left his hands.

That kind of confidence and that kind of skill level for a guy that size, that's impressive. But if he had taken seven more shots, I would've been happy with that."

On how important the next three games are for K-State...

"I'm not thinking of three games, I'm thinking about one game. It's about one game, one mission, you win at home. Like I told radio and I'll say right now to our fans, any team that comes to Bram and experiences the Octagon of Doom like what it's supposed to be has left with an L. The ones we played in January when the students weren't there, they didn't get to feel the doom.

We're not good enough without our fans. I need our students at the game. ... I'm asking our students to show up for this next one. We need them, we don't win without Bramlage being the Octagon of Doom. This is a challenge to our fans and our students."

On the difference between the winning streak and losing streak...

"During our win streak, our DER [defensive efficiency rating] was like 94.5. The next two games after that, it was 115 point whatever. That's defense. That's defensive effort. We're capable of holding teams ... We just hadn't done it."

On the offensive rebounding allowed and if that was effort...

"Defense doesn't stop until we get the ball. Our first shot defense has been pretty good, and we gotta get the ball off the glass. We had too many bobbles and too many times that we didn't box guys out."

On UCF dominating the defensive stats...

"I just don't think we closed possessions. This whole thing changes if we end possessions with a block out. We get the ball with two hands and all that changes.

I thought their effort in the second half to go to the offensive glass was greater than their effort in the first half. And I don't think our attention to blocking out in the second half was very good."

On why the scoring runs happened for UCF...

"I just think everything starts on the defensive end. We were getting stops and stuff like that, but we weren't getting the rebound. I know we could've had a lot of points in transition. That was part of the game plan but we couldn't get in transition because we didn't get the rebound. I felt like they went on that 10-0 run because we couldn't get a rebound, they just kept getting offensive rebounds."

On the difference between the win streak and losing streak...

"On that six-game winning streak, it felt like there was a different type of energy, defensively and offensively. We were getting rebounds, we were pushing it up the floor, getting to the hoop, getting fouled. It's not that we're not doing it now. It's just, then, we had a different type of energy and I definitely feel that."

On how frustrating the scoreless runs in a close loss...

"It definitely is very frustrating because no one wants to lose the game. But we dig ourselves a 16-point hole in the best league in the country, it's pretty hard to come back from. To be honest, all we can do is learn from this. We got another one coming up. We can't get this one back."