(Photo by Victor Tan / New Day Review)
ORLANDO, Fla. – At the beginning of every college-football season, each team has its own goals. For some, it’s becoming bowl eligible; for others, it’s winning a conference championship and potentially a national title. But as the regular season winds down, those goals slip away at the unforgiving hands of defeat.
UCF entered the 2017 season with goals of an American Athletic Conference title, and that goal is still alive, thanks to an unblemished record. With an undefeated record this late in the year, players understand they have to be extra careful in their final four games of the regular season.
“Yeah, you know, one slip-up—we can lose everything,” UCF sophomore wide receiver Dredrick Snelson said after practice on Oct. 30. “So we just practiced on, like, perfecting our craft in practice. You know, detailing everything so that that doesn’t happen to us because, like, we focused on something bigger this year, and we’re gonna get it.”
At 7-0 and 4-0 in the AAC, the Knights are one of only five undefeated teams, entering Week 10. UCF is the only team in the Group of Five that has yet to lose.
Of the undefeated, the Knights are also the lowest-ranked in the first College Football Playoff rankings. UCF is No. 18 in the rankings, and the next-lowest is the 10th-ranked University of Miami.
This is the first time in program history the Knights have been in the CFP rankings and also the first time UCF has started 7-0. But because UCF is a non-Power Five school with relatively little historic accolades, redshirt senior Aaron Evans knows there is even less room for error for the Knights.
“We definitely have to have our guard extra high going into each and every game because people will doubt us even more if we slip and fall,” Evans said after practice on Oct. 30. “And I think that’s really important that we keep our head to the, like, grindstone and to keep working and don’t lose focus.”
In Week 9, against FCS program Austin Peay State Univeristy, UCF played, perhaps, its sloppiest game of the season. The Knights allowed a season-high 33 points and committed eight penalties for 81 yards. With the bevy of mistakes and miscues against the Governors, outside-linebacker Titus Davis believes the team has been put on notice.
“Well [the Austin Peay game] definitely opened our eyes, and, at halftime, I mean, we came out kinda lackadaisical,” Davis said after practice on Oct 30. “They scored first drive, and it was kinda eye-opener for us. But we went to the sideline. We kinda made corrections. And they still managed to get some points on the board, but, halftime, same speech was that you can’t sleep on anybody.”
One relatively local situation that serves as a reinforcer to the Knights’ recent eye-opening experience is the previously undefeated University of South Florida. The then-No. 17 Bulls lost for the first time this year in a 28-24 Houston Cougars win highlighted by a game-winning touchdown with 12 seconds to go.
USF and UCF will meet at the end of the season in the “War on I-4” matchup on Nov. 24 at Spectrum Stadium. Both schools were on a collision course for a matchup between two unscathed teams for the right to go to the 2017 AAC Championship Game and possibly a New Year’s Six bowl.
With the Bulls’ loss, the Knights have become more cautious. Senior Jamiyus Pittman said the Knights can’t afford to have the same type of performance they had against Austin Peay again.
“Yes, thankfully for us, it wasn’t Houston that we were playing…and we didn’t play well,” Pittman said after practice on Oct. 30. “So, I mean, if you go against a team like Houston or [Southern Methodist University] and don’t play well, that’s what can happen. You get a ‘1’ in the L column.”
The Knights have four games left in the regular season. Of those four, two are at home. As the highest-ranked Group of Five Team, an undefeated regular season gives the Knights a good chance to make a New Year’s Six bowl.
With all that’s on the line, Davis said one of the keys to a successful end to the season is to stay focused on the team’s goals.
“It’s definitely pressure, but one thing Coach [Scott] Frost keys on is saying, like, that pressure is something that you feel,” Davis said. “You don’t know what you’re doing, so, you know what I’m saying, we understand our main goals and everything that we’re gonna do this season, so we try to keep that in mind. We don’t think about, ‘Oh, if we slip up, we’re gonna be beaten,’ but, no, we just make sure that we can do everything that Coach has equipped us to do, and we just make plays.”
For more on the Knights, as they prepare to travel to face the SMU Mustangs, follow Ryan Weiss on Twitter at @NDR_RyanWeiss.
