UCF tries to snap 11-game road skid at No. 18 Oklahoma State after blowing 17-point lead at Houston

UCF heads to Stillwater on Saturday trying to shake off one of the most painful losses of Scott Frost's second stint in Orlando. The Knights (3-2, 1-1 Big 12) visit No. 18 Oklahoma State at noon ET at Boone Pickens Stadium, with the game on ESPN2, one week after blowing a 17-0 third-quarter lead in a 27-17 loss at No. 20 Houston.

The setback was UCF's 11th straight road loss. The Knights will try to end that streak against a rested Oklahoma State team that has won three straight under first-year coach Eric Morris and is playing its Big 12 home opener after a bye week.

How the Houston lead slipped away

For most of Saturday night at TDECU Stadium, UCF looked in control. The Knights led 10-0 at halftime and pushed the margin to 17-0 when quarterback Keyone Jenkins ran in from 5 yards with 6:01 left in the third quarter. Will Stone added a 30-yard field goal, and receiver Josh Derry caught a touchdown pass.

Then the game turned. Houston edge rusher Latreveon McCutchin deflected and intercepted a Jenkins pass and returned it to the UCF 2-yard line, setting up the first Cougars score. Houston (4-1, 1-1 Big 12) scored on its final five possessions, 27 straight points over the last 21 minutes, with quarterback Conner Weigman running for three touchdowns.

UCF did not run the ball a single time after taking its 17-0 lead, a detail that fueled criticism of Frost's play-calling. Jenkins, who battled cramping in the second half, finished 23 of 35 for 253 yards with a touchdown and an interception, and backup Kaleb Annett took snaps in relief. Derry led UCF with seven catches for 101 yards.

"Everything was going our way for three quarters," Frost said afterward. "17-0 in the third quarter, you feel great. You have a chance to get a stop there and really be in control of the game, and we didn't."

UCF's season so far

The Knights are 3-0 at home and 0-2 on the road.

The quarterback picture changed early. Alonza Barnett III, the James Madison transfer who led the Dukes to a 12-2 record and a Sun Belt title in 2025, won the starting job but injured his hamstring at Pittsburgh. Jenkins, a transfer from FIU, has started since, and in the win over TCU he completed 19 of 20 passes, a school-record 95% completion rate.

Frost under the microscope

Frost's first UCF tenure is still the high-water mark for the program: he took over a team that went winless in 2015, reached a bowl game in 2016 and went 13-0 in 2017 before leaving for Nebraska. He returned to Orlando for the 2025 season, and this is his fourth season overall at UCF. The Houston collapse, and the decision to stop running the ball with a big lead, revived questions about game management that followed him at Nebraska, where several close losses defined his tenure. A strong showing in Stillwater would quiet some of that noise.

A long injury list

Frost spent much of his Monday news conference going through injuries. He said he does not expect Barnett back against Oklahoma State, which means Jenkins will likely make his fourth straight start.

• Center Jacob Maiava was carted off at Houston with a hip injury. "Maiava got turned in a weird way," Frost said. Cooper Terpstra and Connor Meadows filled in.
• Linebacker Jayden Jennings left the Houston game hurt but has a good chance to return, Frost said.
• Linebacker Lewis Carter remains out with a knee injury.
• Running back Duane "Speedy" Thomas Jr. has a chance to play after being ruled out the previous two weeks.
• Derry rolled an ankle against Houston.

Despite the collapse and the injuries, Frost insisted the locker room would hold together. "These guys aren't going to fracture," he said.

Oklahoma State's surge under Eric Morris

Oklahoma State is one of the early stories of the Big 12. The Cowboys lost their opener 24-10 at Tulsa, then upset then-No. 6 Oregon 39-31, shut out Murray State 59-0 and won 41-24 at West Virginia on Sept. 26. That victory ended an 18-game Big 12 losing streak that stretched back to Nov. 25, 2023, and an 11-game road skid, and it gave the Cowboys a 3-1 start for the first time since 2021.

The engine is quarterback Drew Mestemaker, a transfer from North Texas, where Morris was previously head coach. He was named AP Player of the Week after the Oregon upset and threw for a season-high 389 yards and three touchdowns at West Virginia, completing 20 of 27 passes, with 274 of those yards coming after halftime. Wyatt Young and Justin Bowick lead a receiving corps that will test a UCF secondary coached under defensive coordinator Alex Grinch, and Caleb Hawkins handles the bulk of the carries.

Oklahoma State moved up to No. 18 in the AP poll during its open week.

Keys for UCF

Three things will likely decide whether the Knights can end their road skid:

• Finishing. UCF has shown it can build a lead on the road; it has to keep running the ball and managing the clock in the second half.
• Pass defense. Mestemaker carved up Oregon and West Virginia, and UCF has to limit explosive plays without a fully healthy linebacker group.
• Ball security. The McCutchin interception swung the Houston game. Jenkins has been efficient, and UCF needs that version of him in a hostile stadium.

Duke Watson, a Louisville transfer, gives UCF a capable lead back, and senior tight end Dylan Wade, a John Mackey Award watch list pick, is a matchup weapon if the Knights can protect Jenkins.

What's next

UCF and Oklahoma State kick off at 11 a.m. local time, noon in Orlando, on ESPN2. A win would push the Knights to 4-2 and 2-1 in Big 12 play and end a road losing streak that has hung over the program. A loss would drop them to .500 in the conference. Oklahoma State goes to Houston on Oct. 17.