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UCF falls to 0-8 as No. 22 Houston rolls in Orlando

 
Published Oct. 25, 2015

ORLANDO — Even in a 59-10 victory, No. 21 Houston got a little taste of adversity on Saturday.

"We train for adversity. We spend an inordinate amount of time on how to respond," coach Tom Herman after the Cougars came back from a sluggish start to dominate winless UCF, handing the Knights their worst home loss in program history.

Kenneth Farrow ran for a career-high 167 yards and three touchdowns, and after falling behind late in the first half, Houston scored 24 points in 31/2 minutes to win for the fifth time by 21 points or more.

Meanwhile UCF, at 0-8, continued its worst start since going 0-11 in 2004, George O'Leary's first season as coach.

"It was a tale of two halves as far as the game-planning went. We didn't fulfill it the second half," O'Leary said. "It's a 60-minute game; you can't just play 30 of it."

UCF, which entered ranked last offensively among 127 teams in Division I-A, went up 10-7 on Matthew Wright's 48-yard field goal with 4:38 left in the first half. At that point UCF had outgained Houston by 216-74. But the Cougars responded with a six-play, 72-yard drive to regain the lead on Farrow's 26-yard touchdown run with 2:27 left in the first half, and the rest of the game was all Houston.

Interceptions by cornerback William Jackson III and safety Khalil Williams set up another touchdown and a field goal in the final 50 seconds of the half for Houston.

Tristan Payton scored UCF's touchdown on a 46-yard pass from Justin Holman, but the Knights had four turnovers and gained just 105 yards after the first quarter on their way to being outgained 600-280.

Navy 31, Tulane 14: Keenan Reynolds ran for two touchdowns and the host Midshipmen forced three straight turnovers in the second half. Reynolds is two shy of the NCAA record for rushing touchdowns set by former Wisconsin tailback Montee Ball (77) from 2009-12. But he was held to 38 yards on 23 carries as the Green Wave, which stacked nine players in the box, allowed 133 rushing yards to a Navy team which entered ranked third nationally at 335.4 yards rushing per game.

Cincinnati 37, UConn 13: Gunner Kiel, returning from injury to make his first start in a month, threw for two touchdowns and ran for one as the host Bearcats won their first conference game. Kiel threw for 327 yards.