The start of Big 12 play has not gone well for West Virginia and UCF.
The Mountaineers and Knights join hapless Oklahoma State as the only schools off to an 0-3 start in conference action. On the plus side, somebody will earn their first Big 12 win Saturday afternoon when West Virginia visits UCF in Orlando, Fla.
The Mountaineers (2-4, 0-3 Big 12) are on a three-game skid since collecting a 31-24 nonconference home win over Pittsburgh on Sept. 13. During its losses to Kansas, Utah and BYU, West Virginia surrendered 1,436 yards while being outscored 127-48.
In the first year of Rich Rodriguez’s second coaching stint with the school, the Mountaineers are getting outscored 76-13 in the first half of league games and have not led at any point. In their 38-24 loss Oct. 3 at BYU, redshirt freshman quarterback Khalil Watkins was 7 of 15 for 81 yards in his first career start while freshman Scotty Fox Jr. completed all three of his passes for 54 yards.
“He played hard,” Rodriguez said of Watkins. “I think he’d like to have some plays back, but that was a tough environment to make your first start.”
The young duo will get more playing time now that Nicco Marchiol (foot) will miss the rest of the season and backup transfer Jaylen Henderson (undisclosed) was ruled as doubtful for Saturday’s game.
“So the two young guys have been taking more reps, which is good for them,” Rodriguez said. “Every rep they can take is going to help with their growth.”
West Virginia’s 22.3 points per game are second-worst among the 16 Big 12 teams. Wilkins is 10 of 21 for 144 yards while Fox has thrown eight passes and carried the ball 12 times.
Whoever starts at quarterback may hand off a majority of the snaps as the Mountaineers are fourth in the Big 12 at 206.2 rushing yards per game, which includes 199.3 rushing yards per game in league play.
While the Mountaineers are coming off blowouts, Central Florida (3-3, 0-3) has been competitive in Big 12 games. After a 14-point loss at Kansas State on Sept. 27, the Knights followed it up with a 27-20 loss to Kansas and last week’s 20-11 loss at Cincinnati.
Cam Fancher completed 28 of 49 passes for 222 yards last week while rushing for 109 of UCF’s 191 yards and a touchdown. The Knights are averaging 200 yards on the ground.
UCF took the loss despite holding possession for 39 minutes, 44 seconds and running 90 plays to the Bearcats’ 48. The Knights only got to the red zone once because they sabotaged their possessions by committing 10 penalties.
During its three-week slide, UCF committed 22 penalties and converted 14 of 46 third downs.
“That’s three weeks in a row where we have shot ourselves in the foot on a lot of drives. And that’s got to get better,” Knights coach Scott Frost said. “The discouraging part is we’re fighting with these guys but not winning. The encouraging part is that the stuff going wrong, we can fix.”
