DALLAS - The UCF football team gave up 17 points in the second quarter and couldn't recover as SMU prevailed 55-28 in American Athletic Conference action Saturday at Gerald Ford Stadium.
The Knights (6-4, 4-3 AAC) scored first, on a 18-yard pass from freshman Mikey Keene to junior Ryan O'Keefe, and then took a 14-7 lead on a 6-yard touchdown run by redshirt freshman Parker Navarro, but it wasn't enough.
The Mustangs (8-2, 4-2 AAC) tied the game at 14-14 on a 56-yard touchdown run by Ulysses Bentley and took a lead they did not relinquish when Tre Stiggers found the end zone from 10 yards out to make it 21-14 late in the first quarter.
SMU got a 29-yard field goal, a 16-yard touchdown run from Siggers, and an 8-yard touchdown pass from Tanner Mordecai to Rashee Rice in the second quarter to extend its lead and the Mustangs never looked back.
The Knights gave up 631 yards of total offense, the most they have given up this season, and only put up 333 yards of their own offensively.
Mark-Antony Richards scored twice on the ground, the first multi-score of his career, including a 58-yard scamper in the third quarter that was the longest play of the season for UCF.
COACH MALZAHN
"They played really well in all three phases. We couldn't stop them. For a couple weeks, we had been doing a good job of stopping the run. When you don't stop the run, it opens up everything. Overall, it was a real disappointing loss. We've got to learn from it, we've got to grow from it, we need to heal up a little bit, and we've got to finish this thing, the next two games, at home."
SOUNDS OF THE GAME
