For about two and a half quarters, it looked like the UCF Knights were going to pull off a major upset against the Houston Cougars. Then, with a 17-0 lead, things started to spiral, and the Knights lost 27-17.
There was plenty of criticism to go around. However, many fans targeted head coach Scott Frost for his playcalling later in the game. In particular, UCF not running the ball a single time after taking the 17-0 lead.
DFaulk_23 on Twitter/X wrote about how big the change was. Outside of a quarterback scramble, UCF rushed for 48 yards on their second-half touchdown drive. They then threw the ball the rest of the way.
That left Nick Geddes, a host of Charge On: A UCF Football Podcast, to share some of his own thoughts. He wrote, “Scott Frost has a lot to answer for today. You can’t go an entire half abandoning the run like that when you were up 17-0. 11 consecutive losses on the road is nuts.”
UCF Knights Head Coach Scott Frost on Playcalling
The question of running plays, or lack of running plays, came up in the postgame press conference for Scott Frost. There, he explained that the scheme against Houston called for RPOs, trying to counter what the Cougars do on defense.
“Yeah, it isn’t that we didn’t call run plays,” Frost said. “They’re very multiple, and they’re going to give you different looks a lot, and all our run plays had RPOs on them. When they get too many in the box, we’re throwing the RPO.”
RPOs are, of course, Run-Pass Option plays. UCF would have receivers run routes and give the quarterback the option to pass or hand the ball off, based on how the defense reacted post-snap.
While that may explain why UCF’s running backs got fewer touches, it doesn’t excuse the fact, either. Frost knows this. The ball needs to be in the hands of their home run hitters, especially when the offense is stuck in first gear.
“So that led to fewer carries, but it isn’t like we didn’t call run plays. That being said, Duke’s one of our most explosive guys. Swint’s one of our most explosive guys. We’ve got to make sure that they impact the game however we have to do that. Duke did once. We need that to happen multiple times,” Frost said.
UCF running back Duke Watson led the way with 9 carries for 50 yards. Taevion Swint had 3 carries for 19 yards. For both, it was their second-worst outing of the season, only trailing the Pitt game in a rainstorm. Incidentally, that was UCF’s other loss of the season and another game where the offense was criticized for passing too much.
UCF Isn’t Running Many Plays
When Scott Frost took over at UCF in 2016, the goal was to go fast on offense and run plenty of plays. By 2017, the Knights had one of the best offenses in the country. A decade later, Frost is back at UCF, but the offense is moving much slower than it ever has before.
That speed of the offense, along with some issues sustaining drives, has led to UCF not running enough plays. Against Houston, it was 59 plays. The Knights only ran 53 plays against Pitt, 57 against Georgia State, and 53 against TCU.
“Yeah, I don’t know. We can go faster. When you look at that game, I think the last thing we want to do is put our defense out there more,” Frost said.
“We’ve got to make a decision if playing faster with more tempo is going to help us score or if it’s going to be a detriment to our defense being really solid.”
The result has been leaving the UCF defense on the field for too long. They tired out over time and eventually the dam broke. That’s what happened against Houston and the Knights can’t afford to have it happen again.
UCF HC Scott Frost Defends Playcalling Amid Growing Criticism in Houston Loss