Knights implode against Houston in second half

As he walked off the field in Houston following his team’s second late-game implosion in three weeks, UCF head coach Scott Frost was thinking about what went wrong, and why it happened yet again.

For the second time in three games, the Knights carried a seemingly insurmountable lead into the third quarter, only to suddenly lose all offensive ability and let a three-touchdown lead collapse into a loss.

“It was just kind of a slow death in the second half,” Frost said in a postgame press conference. “We were on the headsets trying to find ways to avoid it.”

This time the Knights were up 24-3 on Houston, a team that a week earlier had been ranked No. 11 in the nation. All they had to do was hold it. Instead they let Houston score four straight touchdowns, while quarterback McKenzie Milton, who had led the Knights to that giant lead, also captained their horrific demise.

After Houston’s first touchdown in their second half comeback, the Knights’ next five drives ended with a fumble, interception, punt, interception and a fumble. But UCF’s defense did its best to try to stop the Cougars, despite being forced onto the field again and again after catastrophic drives. At one point the Knights’ offense gave Houston the ball on the UCF 39, and the Knights’ defense stopped Houston at the 15-yard line to get the ball back. On the very next play Milton threw the ball right back into Houston hands, forcing the UCF defense right back onto the field. Four plays later, Houston had another touchdown.

“Our kids were fighting, but you can't make mistakes against a team like that,” Frost said.

By the time Houston was tied, the momentum had long since taken on the look of inevitability. Houston’s touchdown drives in the second half would average only 2:28 of field time as they marched down the field each time with ease, frequently needing only half a field as UCF fumbles and interceptions handed them the ball in Knights territory.

Against Temple and Houston, the Knights were up an average of 24.5-5 in the first half, and lost both games. In between, they outlasted a UConn team that has only won a single conference game so far.

Thankfully for the Knights, (4-4, 2-2) they get to face Tulane in a rain-postponed rematch this Saturday. The Green Wave (3-5, 0-4) are fresh off a 35-31 loss to a formerly struggling SMU.

The last time the two teams met, Oct. 3 of last year, a season that would see the Knights go 0-12 and Tulane finish 3-9, the Green Wave battered the Knights 45-31, in what would turn out to be UCF’s highest-scoring game all season.

The game kicks off at 5 p.m., broadcast on ESPN3 and 96.9 The Game.