UCF faces another tough foe for its homecoming game when No. 21ranked Houston comes to town Saturday.
As the old saying goes, there’s little rest for the weary.
And winless UCF still has three weeks left of battling American Athletic Conference giants before the team can enjoy its only bye week after Saturday’s loss to Temple guaranteed the Knights will finish with a losing record.
The challenges keep getting tougher, the heartbreaks get more pronounced and the misery outside of the football offices grows with each passing week. Adding salt to an already open wound is the fact that UCF (0-7 overall, 0-3 AAC) gets to celebrate homecoming Saturday against No. 21 Houston (6-0 overall, 3-0 AAC), its toughest conference foe to date. The game kicks off at noon and will air on ESP News.
When asked if he felt bad for the Knights’ older players, UCF coach George O’Leary said he is pushing the team to fight for a win.
“Football is a business and most of our wounds have been self-inflicted, in my opinion,” O’Leary said. “No one wants to lose, but it’s a factor. ... Every week I always talk about, ‘How bad do you want to win?’ ”
Temple almost begged UCF to take the victory last weekend, giving up four turnovers in part due to poor special-teams play. And the Knights’ defense mustered every bit of will possible to create a way for their offense to produce.
There’s more than enough disappointment to go around, particularly for the team’s older players, some of who played during the school’s golden era that included a Fiesta Bowl win. But no one is ready to throw in the towel yet.
“I’d say everybody is pretty strong-minded,” senior H-back Joseph Puopolo said. “Everybody has the same goal in mind; we just want to win and I feel like everybody’s taking that out to practice every day, and I feel like we’re bringing great effort out to practice.”
If UCF wants to have any shot for an upset during its own homecoming game against Houston, it will need that effort to translate to the football field.
The Cougars are riding a wave of confidence behind first-year coach Tom Herman and the nation’s No. 5 offense led by dualthreat quarterback Greg Ward Jr.
And you can expect Ward to have something up his sleeve after Houston’s 17-12 loss last season in Texas.
His potential gamewinning touchdown dive was thwarted by former UCF safety Brandon Alexander.
“It’s like basketball on grass. They spread the field and use all 53 yards of it width-wise and then they stretch the field also vertically,” UCF senior defensive lineman Thomas Niles said. “They’re a good team. They play very good in space, which causes a lot of problems on our side of the ball. So, you know, [you’ve] gotta tackle in space, cover in space. And to cover a lot in space, you need more people to the ball, which is hard when you’re spreading the field. So [we’ve] gotta play great on defense and limit them from scoring points.”
UCF does have a history of beating the odds. In 2009, the Knights upset a then-No. 13 ranked Cougars team led by Case Keenum. Obviously, players will have to make a vast improvement to get a shot at another upset.
“The kids were in sixth grade,” O’Leary said of his current players remembering that game. “But no, I look at us just getting better ourselves; that’s what I look at each week. ... I don’t think it’s a matter of comparing anybody. More so, it’s good to be home. You hope to play better at home.”