The Best Performances Deserve an Encore

The best performances deserve an encore.

What defines the best, though? The simple four-letter word has boundless meaning.

But what makes a college football team the best? Is it history? Top rankings? Tradition? For UCF, that’s not the answer. For the Knights and the Black and Gold faithful, being the best has always been simpler: proving it on the field.

That’s exactly what the UCF football team did in 2017. Play them all, win them all. The lone unbeaten team in the college football world. A Group of Five team, still in its infancy as an FBS program, ascended to the stage well before anyone could have imagined.

The Knights were undoubtedly one of the best teams in college football that season, sparking debates across the country on if a College Football Playoff invite was warranted. Years later, the playoff has been expanded, and the Knights are members of a power conference. While things aren’t remotely the same as Frost’s first tenure in Orlando, the Black and Gold seek to ignite that same pioneer spirit from before.

Sixty-three new names grace the roster of 112 for the 2025 campaign. More than 40 arrive from a different university, 18 are fresh onto the college scene, and a few even cast aside the sport they’ve known to suit up on the gridiron. All in pursuit of a taste of victory.

That taste has faded for the Knights in recent memory, suffering back-to-back losing seasons, including a stretch of five straight losses in each of those campaigns.

A lot can change over a short amount of time, though. While Rome wasn’t built in a day, Frost turned the Knights’ football program from a pumpkin to Cinderella’s carriage in a matter of two seasons, inheriting an 0-12 program and turning it into a 13-0 triumph.

This year’s Knights set out on a mission to change the narrative once again, just as they did eight seasons ago. While history doesn’t repeat itself, it often rhymes. Can the Knights put poetry in motion the second time around?

While the critics on the outside don’t expect much of the Knights, Frost wouldn’t have it any other way.

Despite the team not generating a ton of buzz nationally, a handful of Knights grabbed the attention of watchlists throughout the preseason. Running backs Myles Montgomery and Jaden Nixon headline UCF’s backfield, with both earning spots on the Doak Walker watchlist. Nixon added nods for the Maxwell, Paul Hornung, and Earl Campbell awards, while fifth-year offensive lineman Paul Rubelt landed on the Allstate Wuerffel Trophy list. Nixon and Rubelt, along with edge rusher Nyjalik Kelly, were also named to Phil Steele’s Preseason Big 12 Teams.

Controlling the line of scrimmage is key, and while the Knights have both familiar and new names to win the battles in the trenches, plenty of other names have or will emerge as a fresh campaign unfolds. At the center of it all stands Coach Frost, one of the many men responsible for the best season in program history.

The Knights aren’t chasing a repeat of 2017. They’re chasing something bigger…a rekindling of the Charge On spirit and seeking to make a statement in the Big 12.

The lights are on. The field is painted. The Bounce House will be jumping. The encore begins now.