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TAMPA — UCF hoped to continue its recent dominance at Raymond James Stadium as the Knights took on Georgia Tech in Friday’s Union Home Mortgage Gasparilla Bowl.
The program had won five straight games in Tampa since 2018, and the announced crowd of 30,281 fans hoped to add another victory in its second ‘hometown.’
But the Yellow Jackets had other ideas, scoring 27 unanswered points in the final three quarters to rally for a 30-17 win.
Quarterback John Rhys Plumlee finished 16 of 29 for 198 passing yards with 2 touchdowns before leaving late in the fourth quarter after reinjuring his right knee.
The loss sent UCF (6-7, 3-6 Big 12) to its first losing season since 2016 and wrapped up its first season in the Big 12.
“We’ll put this behind us and turn the page pretty quickly going into next year,” said Malzahn. “We’ve got a lot of talented guys coming back and a great recruiting class, and we’ll do well in the [transfer] portal, so we’ll put this [loss] behind us.”
Here are three things learned from the loss:
UCF can’t overcome surging Georgia Tech in Gasparilla Bowl loss
Knights continue to struggle to stop the run
UCF’s inability to stop the run ranked as one of the season’s biggest disappointments. That trend continued on Friday as the Knights could not contain Georgia Tech’s ground game as the Yellow Jackets rushed for 284 yards and two touchdowns. It was the fifth time this season that UCF allowed more than 225 rushing yards in a game.
Running back Jamal Haynes became the 10th player to rush for over 100 yards against UCF’s defense this season in rushing for a career-high 128 yards, 85 of which came after initial contact. The redshirt sophomore averaged 7.1 yards per carry and escaped 7 missed tackles.
Haynes wasn’t the only Yellow Jacket to take advantage of the porous defense as…
Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/3-things-learned-ucf-loss-192900736.html
Author : Orlando Sentinel
Publish date : 2023-12-23 19:29:00
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