Knights head to Beef O'Brady's Bowl

The UCF Knights have only faced Ball State three times in their entire history. The last time they met was nearly a decade ago, when the Knights lost by less than a touchdown.

Now the Knights (9-4) face a Ball State team (9-3) with the top middle linebacker in the nation gunning for UCF quarterback Blake Bortles’ head. It’ll be a test for the Knights’ offensive line, led by Conference USA First Team center Jordan Rae, to stop Travis Freeman, who has more career tackles — 455 of them — than any college player in the country.

Not that the Knights are shy on defense, with five players flirting with triple digit tackles this season alone. Led by free safety Kemal Ishmael — the C-USA defensive player of the year — the Knights have a formidable secondary. Just this season two Knights — Lyle Dankenbring and A.J. Bouye — grabbed two of the top six longest interception returns in UCF history with 78 and 76 respective yards.

And they have a habit of shutting down teams that overestimate them. In the last year the Knights have faced more fourth down conversion attempts than all but one team in the FBS. And among them, they’ve allowed by far the lowest success rate at just above 38 percent. Against Tulsa in the C-USA championship game the Knights only allowed one success out of five attempts.

The Knights will have to face a resurgent Ball State team that’s been accelerating throughout the season in offense. After starting 3-3, the Cardinals won six straight games to finish off the season. That includes a 52-27 rout of Ohio in which they gained 588 total yards, including 169 on the ground for Jahwan Edwards.

In that game the Cardinals used three quarterbacks to throw for 231 yards, but most of their offense came on the ground.

The Knights may have one of the cleanest-throwing quarterbacks in their history in Blake Bortles, who has had two streaks this year without interceptions that have rivaled the Knights’ all-time great, NFL star Daunte Culpepper.

Now at 141 straight pass attempts without a pick, Bortles is looking to lead the Knights to his first bowl game and a hopeful win. The last time the Knights made it to a bowl game in 2010, they shocked the University of Georgia with a 10-6 nailbiter win to grab their first bowl game in program history.

Whether they do it again remains to be seen. The Beef O’Brady’s Bowl kicks off at 7 p.m. on Dec. 21 at Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg, televised on ESPN.