2024 UCF Football Preview | No. 22 Knights Have Big 12 Championship Potential

number 22 UCF 2024 preview on good morning college football hello and welcome to episode 72 of good morning college football I am Nicholas Ian Allen of CFB Winning Edge and campus to canton. thank you so much for joining us today to talk a little bit about our top ranked uh Big 12 team the UCF Knights and that may come as a surprise to many uh just about everyone out there uh has Utah as a big 12 favorite Kansas State in the mix I've seen uh you know Oklahoma State and Iowa State uh both two of the the you know top ranked teams as far as returning production goes uh have uh some you know Big 12 Championship predictions as well um it is a wideopen conference and you know to be honest not many folks that I'm seeing on a national level uh are really talking about UCF as a potential Big 12 championship team and uh I have to admit personally you know as far as my opinion goes um I stand I mean UCF was a team that finished with a uh losing record six and seven overall a losing record in Big 12 play in its first season in the league three and six last year um but as we will dig into the numbers a little bit later uh there's a reason that the team strength power ratings are quite high on UCF we'll dig into uh perhaps some areas where maybe the knights are a little bit underrated nationally but also you know we we do uh even though we've got a pretty good track record at CFB Winning Edge um there are some instances where we overrate teams and so we'll dig into uh maybe some of the potential trouble spots that our numbers uh might be missing for UCF as well but before we dig into that do of course want to uh welcome you and and thank you for uh joining us on the campus to Canton YouTube channel thank you very much for subscribing there for giving this video a like checking out our other uh great content on the channel uh we are here for good morning college football each Monday Wednesday and Friday uh but uh you know we've done now 21 other team previews and we will continue to preview teams as well number 23 coming up next is Wisconsin we've got Tennessee and Utah uh as as uh you know other teams a little bit down the line but uh if you're joining us this morning July 24th uh some of the uh well I should say I mean we're officially in Fall Camp season Florida State a week zero team taking on Georgia Tech in Dublin uh in uh one month 30 days from now August 24th they'll be kicking off that game the seminal have taken the practice field there are a few other teams uh kicking off off in week zero who will be uh practicing today as well so practice reports are coming we will have more news to discuss on good morning college football uh similar to how we did in the early days of the show before we shifted to more of these long form team previews uh which really kind of fit in nicely with uh a little bit of that you know News desert in the uh the deepest days of summer uh in the College Football pre season but with things ramping up um and with you know in one week we'll have 120 teams kicking off the fall camp and and so we really will be overwhelmed especially in that first week with news uh we are going to shift away a little bit from the you know 30 45 or or more some in some cases uh minutes that we we've spent on these top 20 25 teams so keep that in mind that that today for UCF uh will be almost 100% focused on the knights but you're going to start to see more news uh certainly in the next week and then really a shift uh you know one week from now uh to to covering a lot of those practice reports who's taken first team reps what uh injuries are popping up um you know who has there there will continue to be some roster moves as well this time of year uh we usually see a player or two here or there that you know show up somewhat un expectedly maybe a very very late transfer in uh but also sometimes you know players will drop off the roster as well so uh we will be digging into uh as much of that information as we can find pass it along um we'll continue to to preview some teams uh along the way especially rounding out our our top 25 but um it's it's likely that our focus is going to shift especially as we get into the month of August leading up to uh kickoff but uh with that all out of the way let's talk about the number 22 team in our preseason team strength power ratings and it's UCF and and probably as I said a surprise to many the odds makers uh have UCF is the fourth uh team in the Big 12 um you know most folks see Utah Kansas State uh as the teams to beat Arizona is in the mix Arizona was was a really hot team in the very early days of the offseason those way too early uh rankings had the Wildcats you know top 15 nationally um but uh there there are you know the Big 12 is is wide open obviously Colorado gets a lot of eyeballs and and uh headlines um definitely think the the Buffs are going to be uh maybe not a a title Contender personally but um a a difficult matchup for a lot of folks and and there are uh many teams I think that can make a move if if uh uh they get some breaks here and there along the way this is maybe the most wideopen conference in college football and a team like UCF that does stack up pretty well from a talent standpoint um Gus mazon's always been a personal favor favorite I should say um one of the best play callers in college football him uh taking on that role yet again is is I think going to be key the addition of KJ Jefferson really a perfect fit at quarterback for maon and what he likes to do where he has been at his most successful in the past is with a quarterback like Jefferson who uh can be a bruising runner in addition to uh you know Distributing the football quickly and and efficiently um so very excited about this UCF offense as a whole and and think that this team uh certainly will be in the mix even if I was surprised that the knights ended up as our highest rated Big 12 team but uh the oddsmakers have the preseason win total and I'm referring to DraftKings this morning just sort of as a habit that's usually who we use uh to grade our projections um against the knights have a 7 and a half regular season win total as of this morning tied for 33rd in odds to win the college football playoff at 300 to1 so most uh in the market and and the odds makers don't see UCF as a national championship Contender um understandably so but uh a nine to one uh number to make the college football playoff this morning which was 34th uh among teams there and as I said fourth to win the Big 12 uh plus 950 9 and a half to one to win the conference title as our highest rated team you know we don't necessarily make uh bet uh you know Best Bets or or uh advice on that but you could say hey based on on our numbers and based on the fact that as we'll dig into here a little bit we have UCF actually favored in all 12 regular season games uh maybe there's a little value there on the nights as a conference Champion but we are certainly on the high side compared to uh all of the other you know computer analytics systems that we've been using sort of in a composite sense to to see where our ratings go UCF is the third in a line of teams that we have been uh consistently and and pretty uh much an outlier as far as how high we are uh you know North Carolina we talked about Kentucky we talked about and UCF is very much in that same mold uh the uh next highest system that I've seen projection model uh is ESPN's football power index has UCF number 32 uh Kelly Ford the K Ford ratings have the knights 33rd uh beta rank does as well SP plus ESPN and Bill Connelly's SP plus uh good bit lower on the knights at number 48 and and none of those you know media uh members who've done post spring top 25 rankings that we've referred to quite a bit um you Andy staes at on three we've talked about Mark schau at ESPN uh Stuart Mandel at the athletic um none of the preseason magazines the the Athlon Sports we've referred to the sporting news as well uh Phil steel none of those have the knights as a top 25 team so uh we are very much out there on our own uh and admittedly last season this time last year uh we were much higher on UCF than and you know proved to be uh you know correct we we were we were a little too optimistic on UCF so I'm I'm a bit worried that there's the potential we will be as well um but also I think that as we'll dig into here in just a second UCF was a little bit better team last season that its record would indicate and the fact that uh we've got potentially the perfect fitt at quarterback uh a pretty manageable schedule in a lot of ways and a wide openen conference um maybe we're positioned to to uh look smart at the end of the year instead of instead of dumb but uh we'll see we'll see uh not a whole lot of discussion about Jefferson as a you know 2025 NFL draft uh pick uh potential quarterback we we've referred to uh you know some of the the bright Minds who are digging into the early tape of next year's draft class uh but one piece that we've also referen quite a bit is David hail of ESPN who uh what six weeks ago or so wrote a long piece uh where he tiered all uh 134 FBS quarterback rooms um UCF he slotted into tier 10 alongside Louisville Mississippi State Washington and Wisconsin so a lot of potential there a lot of offenses that have produced uh you know great numbers at at the quarterback position in the past but making a transition um you know bringing in a transfer basically across the board so the potential is there but plenty of questions as well and uh hail has you know made uh added a little blur basically about each quarterback throughout that piece and the one that that uh he uses to refer to KJ Jefferson uh gives a a comparison between two quarterbacks qba qbb uh the numbers are almost exactly the same qba has an 81.4 uh quarterback rating completed 68% of his passes average 7.82 yards per dropback 33 touchdown passes with a turnovers qbb the numberers almost exactly the same 80.5 total qbr 66% completion percentage 7.87 yards per pass uh drop back uh 35 touchdowns and eight turnovers who are these two quarterbacks obviously one of them is KJ Jefferson that was from the 2022 season uh that's quarterback a quarterback B according to hail is Alabama's Jaylen milro from last season who as he mentioned finished six in the Heisman voting uh has Alabama uh ranked in tier one according to hail this season um and also an SEC quarterback like KJ Jefferson was um as hell says you know a year later KJ Jefferson fell off a cliff numerically speaking his his total QB reading here from the piece dropped uh 30 points to 51.1 um so hell you know poses the question Do We Believe milrose production will plummet you know similar to the way that KJ Jefferson did or do we think that Jefferson struggles were a product of a w ful Dan Enos coached offense and he's poised for a big bounceback at UCF will go with the ladder and you know personally I I agree uh think that the the marriage of maon and Jefferson uh is pretty perfect um think that he'll be able to slot into this system and and be uh one of the prod more productive players at that uh QB spot um across college football our stat projections as uh you know a little bit lower because there have been you know some uh uh injury issues at the quarterback uh position for UCF in the past because we do use a three-year window uh for head coach offensive play caller and the team as a whole um you know we're we have uh UCF and and KJ Jefferson as the number 13 quarterback in our fantasy uh projections with with a six-point passing touchdown scoring um which still you know definitely you know high quality basically a quarterback one in most cff leagues uh but I think the potential is there if if everything you know comes together for Jefferson to be a top 10 maybe even top five type player uh for Fantasy purposes this season but let's dig into UCF as a whole going to pull up our 2024 CFB Winning Edge team profiles here uh to discuss last season for the night so uh if this is your first time with us this is what our team profiles look for our UCF page we have 134 of these Pages uh also some national Pages as well that compile a lot of this information going down in the schedule section in the middle scroll all the way to our 2023 results and six and seven was the final record there was a five game losing streak in the middle of the Season that really pulled down uh this team um and during that point UCF was pretty unfortunate in a lot of those games in that five-game losing uh stretch UCF certainly blown out against Candace but every other team if you look at the postgame win expectancy numbers from college football data.com UCF had a 50% or better chance of winning that game so if you were to play that that contest over 10 times 100 times thousand times however many UCF based on those numbers that postgame box score Advanced box score from college football data.com would have won 57% of the time against Kansas State 96% of the time against Baylor that collapse uh UCF fans know was was uh really uh quite unique uh 6 4% against Oklahoma and 56% against West Virginia late season that loss to Texas Tech uh the one you know blemish in a uh three wins and four uh games stretch to finish the season pretty strong also the knights have uh you know an 89% postgame win expectancy number so you know these numbers it's it's not easy to or you know you shouldn't just be flippant about how you label them you know you could say oh man UCF was really unlucky you could say oh man UCF just didn't finish or you know poor coaching there are a lot of different reasons why a team can win a game where it has uh you know less than a 50% chance according to the numbers there are a lot of reasons why a team can lose a game where it has a greater than a 50% chance it's it's not a you know you don't want to paint with too broad a brush there but uh in the grand scheme you would say if you add up all those postgame win expectancy percentages assign you know one full win for that 56 to6 win over Kent State in week one 0 46% of a win when UCF won a rare coin flip against boisey state in week two add all those up you can see down there at the bottom maybe you can see I know it's small print uh on the screen but this UCF team would have been expected on based on second order wins to be uh a nine and four type team you know 9.05 second order wins based on those postgame numbers obviously only won six games maybe should have certainly could have won nine games so the way I look at it this UCF team was better uh three games better which is significant you usually don't see jumps of three full games uh based on second order wins but this was a better team on the field last season than its final record would indicate and then numbers back that up look at our team performance ratings uh here sort of uh in in the center middle bottom UCF ranked 36th in those stats grades that we do again similar to the uh post game win expectancy numbers but look at the underlying stats we try to uh you know use numbers that are only in the regular season that are against FBS opponents only also we filter out garbage time when we can we get hold of those numbers um and UCF played like a top 40 team um top 10 on offense so offensive team performance the knights ranked 10th overall last season number four passing uh so very efficient passing attack last season for UCF number 12 rushing the defense certainly plenty of room for improvement number 88 in defensive team performance overall much better against the pass 52nd 87th against the run but overall the knights lot lots of opportunity perhaps to improve on the defensive side of the ball few of the individual statistics that we pull out as key um again FBS opponents only in the regular season only for our scoring margin where UCF was 47th in uh points per game on net on margin there 38th on offense 64th on Defense Net yards per play UCF ranked among the top 20 nationally that's long time been a favorite stat of mine among the the favorites uh yards per play on the offensive side of the ball you know explosive number six nationally but defensively uh offered a lot of big plays as well 81st but take it on average on margin 16th uh points per Drive in my opinion a little bit better in this number from Brian foro does filter out garbage time uh UCF ranked 53rd in net points per Drive 32nd on the offensive side of the ball 88 defensively net yards per pass attempt that's where that explosive passing game comes in UCF a team that can run the football quite well Gus maon historically uh has had some really really good rushing offenses that creates big play opportunities down the field um and it worked for UCF last season number 12 in offensive yards per pass attempt number 48 in yards per pass attempt allowed so a little bit better there um defensively number number 14 on net success rate usually usually an area where UCF especially on the offensive side of the ball you would expect um would Excel but little bit of a step back 35th on the offensive side of the ball a huge huge struggle defensively for UCF last season 124th in success rate against so that number on net uh big drop to number 77 overall but our EPA per play expected points added uh equivalent that we use from college football data.com they call it PPA uh but UCF was a top 25 team and EPA margin PPA margin top 20 on the offensive side of the ball 56 defensively the little bit better so especially on defense some of the numbers little bit all over the place uh but you know pretty consistent uh much worse defensively than offensively so if this UCF team truly is going to play to its level of potential this season the defense is going to have to take a step forward or the offense is just going to have to uh be elite to the point where it can just outscore uh their opponent regardless of of what the defense does um but who's coming back from this team you know these numbers certainly uh don't always equate quite perfectly from one season to the next that's why we've got our returning production database from CFB Winning Edge and available to our uh C2C Winning Edge and and all 22 members at campus to canton.com UCF ranks 72nd nationally in our overall uh adjusted returning production so that includes incoming transfers if we were just to look at Raw returning production based on who's coming back and who's not from last year's roster UCF would have ranked 104th so being aggressive in the transfer portal especially at the quarterback position on the offensive line and on the defense as a whole UCF has really made some positive movement up our rankings uh when adjusting for incoming transfers 85th in adjusted offensive production on the offensive side of the ball 45th defensively uh but again those numbers would have been very close to uh triple digits in raw production 96th on offense 97th on defense uh so the incoming transfers are going to be relied on for that experience in production certainly the passing situation John rice Plumley he'll be missed he he was uh an explosive passer didn't you know obviously throw it around uh as much as as some of the more prolific uh passing teams last season but hit big plays consistently 8.9 yards per pass attempt um is a a solid goal to shoot for I think for UCF um most seasons taking care of the football uh you know can be a little bit of a struggle Jefferson struggled with that as well both of them had eight interceptions last year but hopefully this UCF offense will see a an improvement as far as yard for pass attempt from Jefferson who had just 7.1 last season uh you would expect or hope a you know Big 12 contending team uh would be in the nines next year so you know low nines and and the potential is there uh not likely but we have seen you know some of the the more um explosive offenses some Lincoln Riley coached offenses in the past at Oklahoma get into the double digit range uh that's possible and and certainly Jefferson I think will have some games where he puts up double- digit numbers if if ucf's able to to hit some big plays uh through the air and in part because the rushing attack should be certainly could be one of the best in college football RJ Harvey um put up huge huge numbers last year, 1416 yards on the ground average 6.3 yards per carry 16 rushing touchdowns and then joining him is a running back who put up numbers that were just as good at Toledo Penny Boon spent the spring at Louisville transferred again to UCF he and Harvey are one of the most productive running back Duos in the country they'll be overshadowed by the the duo at Ohio State maybe even pin State some others in the mix as well but as far as just the the numbers go it really doesn't get better than two 1400 yard rushers two running backs with 15 or more rushing touchdowns I'm very curious to see how they split up the workload between Harvey and Boon but keeping both of those guys fresh um is going to be key for UCF and definitely think you know split you know not having both go for 200 uh carries you know maybe hurts a little bit for Fantasy purposes because both you know Harvey was a first round pick I think early on in cff drafts slipped a little bit with the addition of Boon Boon you know slipped a little bit as well after transferring from Toledo but those two together in a pure college football stance uh you feel pretty good about uh the depth there and then Johnny Richardson a guy who had four you know over 500 yards on the ground last season uh didn't get in the touch or didn't get in the the inzone very much but um certainly depth at running back looks very very good for UCF this season K Jefferson can run it a bit as well Arkansas didn't lean on him quite as much last year or or I should say say the I mean 161 attempts so they did lean on him but um the numbers uh have some room for improvement even with a quarterback running for nearly 450 yards last season the touchdowns absolutely have room for improvement Jefferson's in the you know 240 pound 250 range um so somebody who can uh get you one or two yards down uh by the goal line as needed think that his rushing numbers certainly uh have the potential to uh increase this year losing Javon Baker um you know will hurt but Kobe Hudson uh has the ability to step up and and put up just as good of numbers if not a little bit better uh this season uh over 20 yards 20 and a half per catch very explosive for Kobe Hudson uh think that his uh targets and receptions will go up a little bit as well not having to split with Baker uh Xavier Townsen solid depth at the position um adding javarus Johnson to the mix as well jacobe Jones who was limited to three games last season but has done some good things in the past uh tight end Randy Pitman has potential started to develop as a receiver as well so overall the receiving Corp even though losing Baker uh losing Alec holler is is uh you know not nothing but um that position group looks pretty good as well on the offensive line two full-time starters are moving on bul Schmidt was a halftime starter uh getting back marcelus Marshall and Amari kite is key Adrien medley got six games uh in the starting lineup as well a couple for Kaden kitler as a freshman pardon me last season the addition of West dorsy is going to be key he's one of a couple of incoming transfers that could and and maybe uh will end up as starters defensively Jason Johnson was a bit of a tackle machine last season Walter Yates as well there those those top two tacklers for the knights last season moving on the linebacker position certainly hit hard but as you can see Josiah Pierre Ethan bar coming in those two expected to take on significant roles uh this season Lee Hunter defensive lineman was the third leading tackler last year uh he is back had 22 pressures um somebody who you know could get in the back field and and make some plays double digit tackles for loss two sacks uh so him returning there in the interior defensive line is big uh but you see other you know players moving on out of Eligibility moving on to a pro career uh Lon Morris Brash J Wilson Dorian Patterson but that light blue color transfers coming in you can see a lot of production uh is is joining the knights this season so that perhaps if you're going to think optimistic Ally about those numbers improving on the defensive side of the ball you can point to an influx of experience uh and production uh coming in in players like DeShaun pace and Byron threats and and mck MC Williams in the secondary those two linebackers we mentioned as well the defensive line little less so but um there are you know some transfers coming in at all three levels of the defense this season going back to our team profiles how does UCF look on paper our projected offensive depth chart not a lot of surprise you know Harvey back as the starting running back Hudson and Townsen were returning starters on uh in the wide receiver core n kite left tackle marcelis Marshall All Conference potential at Right Guard those two are back we've got Jabari Brooks as a uh starting center coming in he uh transferred in from Samford the FCS level uh so didn't show up in the returning production database uh but uh he and West dorsy both have a lot of experience as starters at the division one level coming in um and you can see added depth there through the transfer portal at the skill positions churi Brown transferring in from Miami Boone of course uh Jones and Johnson at wide receiver Evan Morris as well at tight end not a lot of just major uh questions on the offensive side of the ball for UCF sure there are some players who you know didn't play a ton of snaps last season who will be expected to be contributors maybe even starters but for the most part on paper and you can see those roster strength numbers where we take the raw recruiting uh ratings coming out of high school adjust for experience and production get our individual player ratings what we have our our vgr video game ratings very similar not exactly the same but similar in concept to uh the uh college football 25 EA Sports uh video games we've done them since 2018 when the the game was dead so made some adjustments made some improvements we no longer um cap them at 99 like the the video game does um but you can see a lot of players in the 90s Kobe Hudson has huge potential 97 rated player uh KJ Jefferson in the low 90s kite who of course was a big- time recruit at Alabama uh in the the low 90s as well so a lot of talent and also you know just experience and production as well factoring in this UCF offense could be uh definitely a top 20 type offense uh once again is the potential there to be top 10 like they were last season yeah I think so I I certainly do um defensively there are many more newcomers expected to make contributions even though uh the returning production numbers you know little bit better uh not necessarily on net as we discussed but five full-time St uh transfers coming back uh Ricky Barber hopefully be uh a little healthier for longer stretches than we've seen during his UCF career dating back to his time at Western Kentucky was one of the better uh interior defensive lineman production wise in the country I mean put up big big numbers um a couple of years ago hopefully he'll be able to recapture that but UCF does a fairly interesting thing I think bringing in players um you know they they certainly do get some other power four transfers KJ Jefferson SEC starter right um but they are not afraid to take an FCS performer they're not afraid to take somebody who's been um you know productive at a lower level uh and slap that player in and expect them to contribute right away maybe even start there are you know other uh former fourstar type recruits who maybe transfer back a little closer to home the Orlando Central Florida area um but also especially on defense especially when maon and his coaching staff are looking to turn this group around quickly you can see a lot of these players are very experienced uh pace and threats played more than 80% of snaps for their teams last season are basically you know multi-year starters the same for bar and Pierre uh as far as their just number of starts go dalen doson as well very very experienced a lot of these newcomers coming in and uh think are going to if you're a UCF fan you're hoping uh gel pretty well with the more experienced core returning and we'll get to see some improvement as far as those defensive numbers go but taking a look at our official projections uh looking at at the schedule here and I'll zoom in just a bit I mentioned it before but you can see it there in black and white we have UCF favored in all 12 regular season games the knights probably won't be in you know the market as far as the odds makers go um and I'm not saying I expect UCF to win all of these games uh quite honestly UCF is a top 25 team number one in our big 12 Power Rankings makes me personally a little bit nervous but the way these numbers are built um they take out my opinion and and hopefully that we do it in a way that allows us to sort of uh show a team maybe UCF as an example that might be a little bit underrated nationally um you know perhaps more uh of those very very smart plugged in uh media Outlets uh should think of UCF as as a team that could compete for a big 12 title or ba top 25 type team um we'll see you know maybe maybe we'll end up looking smart maybe we'll end up looking uh dumb and and folks will say Obviously UCF wasn't going to uh make that big of a jump they went six and seven last year they struggled so much they lost so many games that they should have won we'll see we'll see how it all works out but on paper with my opinion not a part of this at all based only on the number numbers of how these players stack up position by position how the team performance numbers fold in how the head coach rating of Gus mouson folds in uh it all comes together and and suggests that UCF uh could win every game on the schedule um add up all those projected win percentages similar to the uh postgame numbers do the same thing um and we get 8.3 as our projected win total so we have UCF going over the seven and a half not a huge huge Edge uh but uh have UCF expected to be about an8 and4 team which I think very much could be um in the mix in the Big 12 especially you know as the the final month of the Season that championship game picture the the race to to make that top two uh starts to come into Focus UCF especially against Arizona and Utah maybe West Virginia as well uh is is going to be a factor in those games so if they're not maybe playing for a championship might have an opportunity to be a spoiler especially that Utah game at the end of the season which on a Friday so a little bit of a short week a long trip for the youths um and in a in a tough environment in the Bounce House of course um that that's going to be a tricky spot for your your big 12 favorite according to most uh Utah at the end of the season but uh the schedule itself sets up pretty well 53rd in our strength of schedule rankings uh should be uh big favorites against New Hampshire even though quality FCS program but still um UCF will have a big Talent Edge there Sam Houston transitioning from the FCS uh struggled a bit last year but better also than its number final record would indicate Sam Houston was a pretty tough team uh most of the Year especially defensively Big 12 opener against TCU a team that certainly could go either way played for a national championship just a couple of years ago missed a bowl last year um but a difficult team to project but absolutely could be uh a bowl team should be probably a bowl team um and maybe have a higher ceiling than that to to get back and get in the mix as well get a week off before uh hosting Colorado that'll be key every UC excuse me every UCF fan I'm sure has that trip to the swamp circled on the calendar uh but then middle of the year there's going to be a lot of games that will Define this UCF season take care of business against uh Cincinnati take care of business against BYU Iowa state will be a tricky uh Team especially in ases but uh certainly a team where UCF is not going to be outmanned as far as Talent goes so a winnable game there as well and then you know that that November schedule as we discussed some real opportunities to uh take on couple of the the you know stronger teams in the Big 12 there is no uh Kansas State on this schedule that perhaps could be key no Kansas as well we are are relatively high on there in the you know late 20 early 30s in our power ratings uh also so um some some key misses as far as the schedule goes there but a lot of games are relative toss-ups that Utah match up less than a onepoint projected spread uh what one two three other games under five points and then you know three others uh less than a touchdown so UCF once again probably going to be playing a lot of close games hopefully uh if you're UCF fan or you know in in some ways I'm a pseudo UCF fan this season because uh I root for our ratings and and uh if we've got UCF as the number one team you know I'm hoping we don't look really silly so uh I will also be with you hoping that UCF uh comes out you know with a lot more uh luck or finding ways to win or or whatever it is uh on those close games that went the other way last season so hopefully UCF is going to play a little bit better on the defensive side of the ball hopefully KJ Jefferson is going to step in reclaim some of that 2022 level of production that David hail outlined and compared to Jaylen milro last season hopefully he and M Gus Mazon uh just are a perfect fit for one another in this offensive system um but also you know that that rushing attack which looks deep and talented and so productive um is going to create some opportunities in the passing game as well but if not they might just you know steamroll some teams especially if that offensive line comes together so this UCF team I think is is H more talented than a lot of folks may expect uh looking at our talent Edge ratings not favored in every game but UCF does have a talent Edge nine out of 12 uh matchups the three that they don't Colorado Florida and Utah um all benefit from a home field advantage man AG adjustment and so uh certainly as far as just the the Raw Talent on hand UCF matches up with everybody in the Big 12 and everybody it'll play this season and even our stats only model what we call prism our projected scoring margin model where we take out all the talent numbers because you could argue you know maybe maybe we're just a little bit too optimistic on some of our UCF player ratings maybe some of the the players who are fourstar recruits who transferred in are are you know boosting those ratings a little bit too much um or maybe even some of the you know FCS or or other uh players who transferred in this year just put up a little more production than than uh should be expected that's a that's a an argument that HT us uh you know was was apt last season when we were a little too high on UCF but the stats only number throw out all those Talent uh ratings and UCF is favored in eight games as well so uh this this is this is a very very solid team um it's got a lot of talent you can look you know at those raw recruiting numbers um top 40 as far as the full roster in average 247 Sports composite rating position by position a lot of uh units near the top 25 nationally quarterback 28th wide receiver 27th defensive line 27th uh defensive backfield 28th the defense as a whole ranks 26 than average 247 composite rating uh there's a lot of talent here and the offense I think even though the the raw numbers aren't quite as good number 53 in average 247 rating um the potential you know on that offensive side of the ball is is much better than that adjust for experience and production and those numbers get even better 27th in offensive average position strength rating 28 in defensive average position rating 31st for the full roster as a whole um it's a it's a it's a good roster uh it's a manageable schedule and I think that the potential is there um even if it makes me very very nervous that we're the only ones that have UCF as a top 25 team the only ones that have UCF is our highest rated Big 12 team um maybe you know we were fortunate in the way that we set up our uh projections and and captured a little value on UCF that others are missing I'm fully prepared as always to look silly uh but trust the process and and perhaps uh We've Unearthed a little bit of a a sleeper in the Big 12 not a lot of folks talking about UCF as a true title Contender but that's going to do it for us today we will be back on Friday as fall camps kick off we're probably not going to do as much you know 45 minute uh Team preview for uh Wisconsin who is our next team up but we will uh certainly try to walk through uh teams more as we round out the top 25 at least and we'll try to sneak a few in as well even when fall camps really are ramping up and we're talking uh national news at length so um thank you so much for joining us thank you for liking this video and subscribing to the campus toon YouTube channel uh and of course thank you to those of you who have signed up at campus toon you can do so for as little as $299 per month get access to those best ball rankings access to our uh cfff C2C and Debbie player rankings written content on the site Discord access uh all kinds of tools you know analytics that you can look at to um unearth perhaps undervalued players and teams but then also for those of you who uh are interested in these team profiles for all 134 teams they returning uction database our stat projections as well um all of those are available to C2C Winning Edge and all 22 tier members so uh thanks so much for joining us hope everyone has a great rest of the week we will be back on Friday with some practice reports and uh a little bit of a a team preview as well so until then take care