Flowers shines during loss
Bulls QB delivers elite performance
Quinton Flowers stood in the pocket for what seemed like an eternity.
Time itself appeared to have stopped as the 6-foot-tall, 215-pound quarterback scanned the field ahead of him. The clock in his head counting down as the senior assessed his best option. Nine, 10, 11 … Flowers makes his decision. He takes off running with nothing but green grass ahead of him, he slips past UCF defenders for a gain of 19 yards.
Flowers reminded everyone why he was named American Athletic Conference Offensive Player of the Year last season by putting up a career-high 605 yards and five scores. It wasn’t enough, with USF falling 49-42 to No. 15 UCF Friday.
“I was locked in and focused on whatever my coach wanted me to do,” said Flowers, who would wind up becoming the sixth player in Football Bowl Subdivision history to post 40-plus rushing and 60-plus passing touchdowns in a career.
USF coach Charlie Strong had never seen a performance like the one he got from his quarterback.
“Quinton was just unbelievable with the way he ran the ball, the way he threw the ball. He just kept getting us out of bad situations,” Strong said.
“You could tell he was going to have a good game. This morning when we were doing our walk, he was off by himself and he had a serious look on his face and you knew tonight was going to be his night.”
While much of the attention this season has been directed toward UCF quarterback McKenzie Milton, who came into Friday’s showdown with the second-best passer rating in the country, Flowers quietly led USF to the brink of its first conference championship.
But despite his best USF fell just short.
After tying the game at 42 with 1:41 left in the game, USF elected to kick off to Mike Hughes. Hughes, who came into the game effort, with a kickoff return for a touchdown, made the Bulls pay for that decision when he returned the ball 96 yards for the game-winning score.
Flowers did his best to try and rally his team again, as USF took over at its own 45-yard line with 1:28 left, finding tight end Mitch Wilcox at the UCF 45 but the ball came loose and the Knights recovered, ending any possible threat.
“That was a tough loss,” Strong said.
Receiver Tyre McCants would set the school record for receiving yards in a game — by halftime — amassing 210 yards on six receptions. He finished as the leading receiver with 227 yards on nine receptions.
Strong was asked if he would have done anything different during the kickoff return by Hughes. The first-year USF coach said he would have used a different defensive formation.
“I have a victory kickoff and it was 1:44, but we had covered well and kicked the ball out of the end zone,” he said.
Strong explained that this formation involves many of his defensive starters and he was afraid that he would need them fresh to stop the Knights on offense.
As it turned out, it didn’t matter.
Instead, UCF will host the conference championship next week against Memphis and USF will be forced to reflect on what might have been.
“We didn’t win the conference championship, but we ended up 9-2,” Strong said.
When asked if he was pleased with that outcome, he responded with a short “yes.”
Flowers was asked how he’ll remember this game in 10 or 20 years.
“I’ll remember that I just went out and played my heart [out]. I gave my all on every play, every down no matter what defense they were playing, no matter what coverage. I gave it my all just to keep the chains moving,” he said.
Strong added Friday’s performance is what makes a series special.
“These are the games that make he said. type of it a rivalry,”