How good is UCF

[Treadway21]

With all this talk about how bad we were, I think some credit should go to UCF for being a good team. To my untrained eye, they were the best team next to TCU we played. They are certainly as good as or better than Tech and Navy, and much better than Houston and UTEP. They are also much better than any team we beat.

They were very good on both sides of the ball. Not great, but real good. After that first drive, I would not have us to kept them to 17 points. We were able to move the ball, but they did clamp down on D when we moved into their territory.

I wish we had played better on offense. And I wish Jones had not taken that penalty on the first drive. And I wish we had gotten that INT in the endzone or recovered that fumble on the punt. But I think we played a good team well.

I would be interested in others thoughts about how UCF stacks up as a team.

Now let the onslaught of posts about no moral victories begin.

[SMUPhil]

For what it's worth, it's highly possible that UCF will now be the highest ranked team in Florida. FSU was #20, but lost yesterday, and UCF was #25 in one of the polls before our game.

Still, I would've loved to come away with a win, and CUSA championship.

[Pony_Fan]

I think Tulsa would have given them a really tough game, if not won yesterday.
But UCF is a good team on both sides of the ball. We aren't there yet.

[sbsmith]

Good, but not nearly as good as I thought. Kyle didn't need to be perfect yesterday to beat them.

[Charleston Pony]

If we hit 50% of the open deep balls, it's a different game...but UCF has good athletes and should give Georgia a good game.

[jkflamebo]

UCF is a good team. They will give Georgia a run for their money.

[Comet]

I would love to see them beat Georgia

[Charleston Pony]

It's time for CUSA to jump up and bite one of these SEC teams before we lose them as an opponent in this game

[rich59]

UCF is a talented, physical and well coached football team. I was impressed with the size and athletic ability of their seconday, especially as compared with ours. They have some talent at QB and running back also. Fot what it is worth, I spoke with a close friend, TCU former great and former SWC coach and he said that he thought that if Padron had not been hurt and had his mobility in the pocket, SMU would have won.

[Harry0569]

AJ Green will have 150 yards receiving.

Call me a homer, but I really feel that SMU should have won that game. We had multiple costly turnovers, and basically shot ourselves in the foot. Yes, UCF is a talented team, but we played like dog crap.

[PonyKai]

AJ Green will have 150 yards receiving.

Call me a homer, but I really feel that SMU should have won that game. We had multiple costly turnovers, and basically shot ourselves in the foot. Yes, UCF is a talented team, but we played like dog crap.

Agreed. If you told me Thursday that we would hold UCF to 17 points, under 320 yards, and outgained them, I would have told you we'd win and probably win big. I would have been very wrong of course.

[ponyboy]

I am a bit of a UCF fan after that game. Good team who might give Georgia more than they can handle.

[goldenstang]

I think that we had every opportunity in the world to win the game. I also believe that UCF is a better team or at least has more talent then we do currently, but I think we catch them soon. I hope they smash Georgia.

[couch 'em]

UCF will get crushed by Georgia. They only scored 17 on our Defense which, while pretty good with Sterling, is pretty vulnerable without Sterling. Then we lost ANOTHER CB on top of that. UCF didn't capitalize.

If Padron's deep ball was on, we would have had 3+ more touchdowns that were right there for us to take.

[PerunaPunch]

From what I saw on the OL and DL, UCF had a size advantage on almost everybody but Margus. They all looked tall and athletic (not fat).

Their QB Godfrey is small but had wheels; he was nothing special in the air. In athleticism he reminded me a bit of Justin Willis, only faster. A solid, if not brilliant option QB. He was faster than our outside linebackers.

I was in a corner of the end zone looking upfield when Latavius Murray hit the 30+ yard TD run. I saw a hole about half a body width wide between two of their OLs and could see daylight straight ahead all the way to the end zone. He hit that fast and was gone. Other than the first drive where Mason said we were trying to figure out how they were going to attack us, I think the D did extremely well especially considering that we lost the speedy outside linebacker we needed for this offense (Youri), Sterling and the Benny. Justin Smart doesn't have the wheels to go side to side, so I was impressed with the way Mason had him coming almost all the time on blitzes. I don't recall whether he was credited for any sacks, but Justin was disruptive and made Godfrey scramble and make plays rather than going to his primary receiver. The D did one hell of a patch job covering for injuries.

As somebody mentioned, UCFs DBs were athletic and physical. Al was shut down for most of the day. Good (tight) coverage by UCF meant Padron had to be precise, which he wasn't. Still, I don't have a count of all the 4th and sumthin's we went for -- and made. The only one we didn't make was the last one.

I thought DJ and Cole had very nice games. If Padron was having difficulty connecting on the long shots, we probably should have stuck to more of the intermediate stuff, but of course you have to throw some of the long ones to open up the underneath routes... I dunno.

I think our kids worked their tails off and came up a little short. UCF was beatable, and we came fairly close.

As a side note: UCF was one of the better C-USA gameday environments I've experienced. We paid $20 to park in a church parking lot across the street, but parking included free hot dogs, chips and drinks. UCF had great fans. They were loud, coordinated in their cheering, and good sports.