ORLANDO — College football narratives shift on a week-to-week, perhaps even drive-by-drive, basis.
For UCF, the heroics of its 35-34 comeback victory at TCU two weeks ago overshadowed a potentially troubling trend revealed for all to see in Saturday’s 48-21 shellacking at the hands of Colorado: The Knights are struggling to get a grip on Big 12 Conference games and are not built offensively to routinely rally from huge deficits.
Gus Malzahn said as much in his postgame remarks after a contest the Knights never led and one they trailed by a margin of at least three scores for the majority of the second half.
“We’re not the best catch-up team, I would say,” Malzahn said.
And yet, for the second time in three weeks, the Knights found themselves in the position of climbing out of a cavernous hole. Four turnovers and three scoreless red-zone drives stunted any chance of the Knights avoiding the fate of falling in its Big 12 home opener for a second year in a row.
The primary issue is pressuring upper-level passers. Aggression was the word repeatedly used to describe first-year defensive coordinator Ted Roof’s system, forcing quarterbacks to speed up their process and put the ball in harm’s way.
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Saturday’s first defensive series, in that regard, was a success. Blitzing safety Braeden Marshall brought back-side pressure on a zone blitz as defensive end Malachi Lawrence dropped into coverage, and Shedeur Sanders threw late over the middle, resulting in an interception for linebacker Deshawn Pace at Colorado’s 29-yard line.
However, Sanders settled in and picked apart the Knights’ secondary as Colorado’s oft-criticized offensive line held up in protection. The Buffaloes scored on seven of their next nine drives and did not punt the football until the 5:18 mark of the third quarter.
Nyjalik Kelly and Lawrence recorded a sack apiece, but UCF has just three as a defensive unit through four games.
“Bottom line is we’ve got to find a way,” Malzahn said. “That’s going to be a big key.”
New Hampshire and Sam Houston’s respective signal-callers failed to capitalize, but Sanders and TCU’s Josh Hoover carved up UCF’s secondary. TCU hit paydirt on each of its first three drives and converted its first seven third-down attempts.
Hoover and Sanders combined for a 72.4% completion rate for 692 yards, seven touchdowns and one pick.
Florida’s QB duo of Graham Mertz and DJ Lagway, whom the Knights will see in the Swamp next weekend, torched Mississippi State on Sept. 21 for a 26-of-28 passing effort, 277 yards and three TDs (all by Mertz).
UCF’s offense is not faultless, though. The Knights have held a lead for 36 seconds over the last two games.
Twice against TCU, the Knights drove inside the opposing 30-yard line and failed to put points on the board — a pair of blocked Colton Boomer field goal attempts. KJ Jefferson spared the Buffaloes’ mistake with an end-zone interception of his own on third-and-goal, squandering a chance to keep the raucous sell-out crowd rocking and to force the Buffaloes to play from behind.
“We’ve got to be efficient in the red zone and come away with points,” Jefferson said. “Whether that’s a touchdown or a kick, we’ve got to come away with something. That right there is totally on me. I take full responsibility for that.”
Now the challenge is preventing a slide, a significant change in tone considering UCF entered its bye week with a 30% chance to win the Big 12, according to ESPN’s College Football Power Index. The Knights endured a five-game slide after a 3-0 start in 2023, failing to record a conference victory until November.
“We’ll learn a lot about our team this week. We’ll find out who we truly are,” Malzahn said. “We were on top of the world with that last win, and now we’re in the tank right there. Who we are as a team, we’re going to find out.”
This article originally appeared on The Daytona Beach News-Journal: UCF Knights football: Multi-score deficits becoming troubling trend
