Bulls and Knights both Lose

Photo-Travis Failey

Tampa, Fla. — It was the same old song and dance on Friday as the UCF Knights earned their 24^th straight win, completing the team’s second consecutive undefeated regular season with a 38-10 victory over USF.

“We’re not a very good football team,” Charlie Strong said. “You look at us and we’re very fortunate to have won the seven games that we won. You look at the last five, when you can’t score, when you have to be able to stop people and you give up the big plays, then it’s really hard. It’s all three phases and we have to get better.”

Photo-Travis Failey

Photo-Travis Failey

While the Knights’ victory will surely be celebrated by the UCF faithful, the most impactful event of the night came on a 3^rd and 7 run that left UCF QB McKenzie Milton hurt on the field following a hit from USF DB Mazzi Wilkins.

Milton was unable to leave the field under his own power and was carted to the locker room with a knee injury.

“You hate to see that happen to Milton because he’s such a competitor,” Charlie Strong said. “Then he goes down and it happened right in front of our sideline. Our thoughts and prayers are with him and I just hope that he’s able to work his way back through it because it’s a really tough injury.”

Photo-Travis Failey

USF QB Blake Barnett missed another game due to injury and Chris Oladokun started for the Bulls. On his first drive the Bulls offense ran just four plays before punting. By the end of his second drive Oladokun was 5 for 8 with 39 passing yards before a deep pass down the sideline was jumped and intercepted by UCF DB Richie Grant. Brett Kean would enter at QB for USF the next drive.

Photo-Travis Failey

Photo-Travis Failey

USF DB Nick Roberts intercepted a pass from Milton just a few plays later and returned it to the UCF 13-yard line, but the Bulls’ failed to execute and turned the ball over on downs following four consecutive runs between the tackles inside the 10-yard line.

Photo-Jordan Raiff

UCF turned around and went 97 yards to open the scoring just before the end of the first quarter when UCF WR Gabriel Davis brought in a 14-yard score from Milton and the Knights took a lead that they would never surrender. K Matthew Wright would add a field goal in the second quarter before a 40-yard rushing touchdown for Greg McCrae – his first of three total scores on the evening – allowed the Knights to open the scoring up a little bit, now leading 17-0.

McCrae ended the night with 181 of UCF’s 391 total rushing yards on 16 carries.

USF finally got on the board with a late-in-the-half field goal from Coby Weiss, bringing the game to 17-3 and on their next drive, with the clock winding down – to the dismay of many fans in attendance – would take a knee and settle for a 14-point deficit entering the locker room for halftime.

USF would punt their two first drives of the second half and the score remained 17-3 until Oladokun was put back into the game and led a touchdown drive that lasted just 2:48.

Photo-Jordan Raiff

Kean finished the game 8 for 17 with just 36 passing yards.

That would be the last drive of the game that didn’t end in a punt for USF as they were able to cut the UCF lead to seven, but just momentarily as the Knights responded with a lightning fast drive of their own, retaking a two score lead at 24-10.

Photo-Jordan Raiff

Much has been said about the offensive struggles that have plagued the Bulls, averaging just 20.2 points over their five-game losing streak, and much of the blame has fallen on offensive coordinator Sterlin Gilbert.

“There’s too many fingers being pointed, too many things being said,” RB Johnny Ford said. “It’s not the coaches at all, it’s the players. It’s not the coaches at all. You can call a play eight times and if you execute that play it’s going to work all eight times. You’ve just really got to go out there being focused on executing the plays.

Notable issues with the Bulls’ offense goes back to last season, but it’s hard to argue at this point that there is a significant issue with both game-planning and execution, in addition to a slew of young players on the offensive line. For the good of the USF football program – in both the short and long term – there will have to be significant changes to this team, whether that be staff changes, game-planning to put players in the best position to succeed, or a complete mental overhaul of their preparation and execution, but only time will tell as USF prepares for their eventual bowl game.

UCF added two final rushing touchdowns in the fourth quarter and would leave Tampa back-to-back War on I4 winners, but also with arguably the most devastating injury in their program’s history.

Here is where CBS Sports predicts the two teams ending up in post-season play:

USF is projected to play Appalachian State in the Cure Bowl in Orlando.

UCF will play Memphis on December 1^st in the American Athletic Conference Championship and is projected to play the University of Florida in the Fiesta Bowl.

FULL TRAVIS FAILEY & JORDAN RAIFF PHOTO GALLERY

UCF Passing

	C/ATT	YDS	AVG	TD	INT	QBR
McKenzie Milton	5/10	86	8.6	1	1	48.3
Darriel Mack Jr.	5/14	81	5.8	0	0	33.8
TEAM	10/24	167	7.0	1	1	—

South Florida Passing

	C/ATT	YDS	AVG	TD	INT	QBR
Chris Oladokun	7/12	77	6.4	1	1	12.3
Brett Kean	8/17	36	2.1	0	0	14.7
TEAM	15/29	113	3.9	1	1	—

UCF Rushing

	CAR	YDS	AVG	TD	LONG
Greg McCrae	16	181	11.3	3	40
Taj McGowan	11	72	6.5	1	20
Adrian Killins Jr.	14	65	4.6	0	21
Darriel Mack Jr.	10	51	5.1	0	13
McKenzie Milton	5	16	3.2	0	5
Bentavious Thompson	2	6	3.0	0	5
TEAM	58	391	6.7	4	40

South Florida Rushing

	CAR	YDS	AVG	TD	LONG
Johnny Ford	16	120	7.5	0	38
Duran Bell Jr.	7	46	6.6	0	12
Jordan Cronkrite	10	30	3.0	0	10
Chris Oladokun	9	8	0.9	0	22
DeAngelo Antoine	1	5	5.0	0	5
Ryeshene Bronson	1	3	3.0	0	3
Team	1	-1	-1.0	0	0
Brett Kean	2	-15	-7.5	0	0
TEAM	47	196	4.2	0	38

UCF Receiving

	REC	YDS	AVG	TD	LONG
Gabriel Davis	5	69	13.8	1	38
Dredrick Snelson	2	60	30.0	0	47
Adrian Killins Jr.	1	18	18.0	0	18
Michael Colubiale	1	11	11.0	0	11
Jake Hescock	1	9	9.0	0	9
TEAM	10	167	16.7	1	47

South Florida Receiving

	REC	YDS	AVG	TD	LONG
Johnny Ford	2	39	19.5	1	34
Mitchell Wilcox	5	38	7.6	0	17
Ryeshene Bronson	2	15	7.5	0	11
Stanley Clerveaux	3	10	3.3	0	4
Tyre McCants	2	8	4.0	0	5
Duran Bell Jr.	1	3	3.0	0	3
TEAM	15	113	7.5	1	34

UCF Fumbles

	FUM	LOST	REC
No UCF Fumbles

South Florida Fumbles

	FUM	LOST	REC
Chris Oladokun	1	0	0
TEAM	1	0	0

UCF Defensive

	TACKLES				MISC
	TOT	SOLO	SACKS	TFL	PD	QB HUR	TD
Nate Evans	10	9	0	1	1	0	0
Pat Jasinski	5	5	0	0	1	1	0
Richie Grant	5	5	0	0	0	0	0
Titus Davis	5	4	0	0	0	0	0
Nevelle Clarke	4	4	0	0	1	0	0
A.J. Wooten	3	3	1	1	0	0	0
Gabriel Luyanda	3	3	1	1	0	0	0
Rashard Causey	3	3	0	0	1	0	0
Joey Connors	3	2	0	0	0	0	0
Eric Mitchell	3	2	0	0	0	0	0
Kyle Gibson	2	2	0	0	2	0	0
Brandon Moore	2	1	0	0	0	0	0
Anthony Montalvo	1	1	1	1	0	0	0
Kenny Turnier	1	1	1	1	0	0	0
Caleb Perez	1	1	0	0	0	0	0
Jake Brown	1	1	0	0	0	0	0
Brendon Hayes	1	1	0	0	0	0	0
Tristan Payton	1	1	0	0	0	0	0
Jacob Harris	1	1	0	0	0	0	0
Trysten Hill	1	1	0	0	0	0	0
Elijah Spann	1	1	0	0	0	0	0
Jon Powell	1	1	0	0	0	0	0
Keenan Johnson	1	1	0	0	0	0	0
Alex Swenson	1	1	0	0	0	0	0
Randy Charlton	1	1	0	0	0	0	0
Aaron Cochran	1	0	0	0	0	0	0
TEAM	62	56	4	5	6	1	0

South Florida Defensive

	TACKLES				MISC
	TOT	SOLO	SACKS	TFL	PD	QB HUR	TD
Khalid McGee	13	9	0	0	0	0	0
Greg Reaves	10	7	0	0.5	0	0	0
Naytron Culpepper	8	6	0	0	0	0	0
Mike Hampton	5	5	0	0	1	0	0
Ronnie Hoggins	4	4	0	0	0	0	0
Brandon Boyce	4	3	1	1	0	0	0
Vincent Jackson	4	3	0	1	0	0	0
Josh Black	3	3	0	0	0	1	0
Mazzi Wilkins	3	3	0	0	2	0	0
Kirk Livingstone	3	0	0	0.5	0	1	0
Juwuan Brown	2	2	0	1	0	1	0
Nick Roberts	2	2	0	0	1	0	0
Chris Barr	2	1	0	0	0	0	0
Keirston Johnson	2	1	0	0	0	0	0
Kevin Kegler	2	1	0	0	0	0	0
Dwayne Boyles	1	0	0	0	0	0	0
TEAM	68	50	1	4	4	3	0

UCF Interceptions

	INT	YDS	TD
Richie Grant	1	0	0
TEAM	1	0	0

South Florida Interceptions

	INT	YDS	TD
Nick Roberts	1	30	0
TEAM	1	30	0

UCF Kick Returns

	NO	YDS	AVG	LONG	TD
No UCF Kick Returns

South Florida Kick Returns

	NO	YDS	AVG	LONG	TD
DeAngelo Antoine	2	39	19.5	22	0
Vincent Jackson	2	11	5.5	9	0
TEAM	4	50	12.5	22	0

UCF Punt Returns

	NO	YDS	AVG	LONG	TD
Dredrick Snelson	2	4	2.0	5	0
TEAM	2	4	2.0	5	0

South Florida Punt Returns

	NO	YDS	AVG	LONG	TD
Tyre McCants	2	2	1.0	2	0
TEAM	2	2	1.0	2	0

UCF Kicking

	FG	PCT	LONG	XP	PTS
Matthew Wright	1/1	100.0	42	5/5	8
TEAM	1/1	100.0	42	5/5	8

South Florida Kicking

	FG	PCT	LONG	XP	PTS
Coby Weiss	1/1	100.0	25	1/1	4
TEAM	1/1	100.0	25	1/1	4

UCF Punting

	NO	YDS	AVG	TB	IN 20	LONG
Mac Loudermilk	6	282	47.0	1	4	66
TEAM	6	282	47.0	1	4	66

South Florida Punting

	NO	YDS	AVG	TB	IN 20	LONG
Trent Schneider	9	441	49.0	1	2	57
TEAM	9	441	49.0	1	2	57