Cincinnati Bearcats Football Must Improve in This Area to Contend for 2026 Big 12 Title

The offseason is winding down for the Cincinnati Bearcats Football program as the group gets ready to tackle the fourth year of the Scott Satterfield era.

Cincinnati starts up fall camp next week, and they are trying to finish this latest campaign much stronger than they have in Satterfield's first three seasons. UC has one November win in that span and has never come back from late-game touchdown-plus deficits under Satterfield.

247Sports's Cody Nagel broke down the fourth-quarter performance of teams across the Power Four (plus Notre Dame) since 2021, and Cincinnati leaves a lot to be desired.

They are a paltry 0-20 when trailing by seven-plus since the start of Luke Fickell's final season and throughout Satterfield's tenure. It's a big reason why their only November win in his tenure came against Houston in 2023.

They've ended two consecutive seasons on five-game losing streaks. It gets hammered home more when looking at their clutch closing rate. UC holds just a 47.5% win rate when the score differential has been within six points entering the fourth quarter (tied for 15th worst).

On the flip side, they are at least holding onto sure-fire wins in the fourth quarter. They boast a 97% win rate when leading by seven-plus points in the fourth quarter. Alas, Cincinnati is just rarely going to have the talent base that helps them lead by that much consistently through 45 minutes in Big 12 games.

Cincinnati has to find a way to close games more soundly this season, and it starts by having a balanced snap diet on both sides of the ball. The nation's worst time-of-possession program by far last year had clear fatigue signs on the defensive side as the season wore on. Plus, they put too much on a banged-up Brendan Sorsby's plate by the end of that losing streak.

The defense needs some help from the offense to stay out of so many high-snap scenarios, and they have to be better themselves. Tyson Veidt's unit last year ranked 107th nationally in defensive stop rate (the percentage of a defense's drives that end in punts, turnovers, or a turnover on downs).

Nate Woody has to fix that to help these comeback dreams turn into reality.

"We got some great linebackers that can really put pressure on offenses, and we got to be able to utilize those guys," Satterfield said at Big 12 Media Days. "I think in this defense we're going to be able to do that, and obviously be able to mix in some coverages with that as well. So that's kind of what we've been doing this whole spring, and as we approach the summer, is finding different ways to be able to do that."

Check out the full numbers from Nagel below:

Who owns the fourth quarter in college football? 🏈

We analyzed every Power Four team (+Notre Dame) over the past five seasons in three scenarios entering the final 15 minutes:

• Leading by 7+
• Trailing by 7+
• Within 6 points

Here's what we found.

More @CBSSportsCFB ⬇️ pic.twitter.com/eLgkTqKEY5
— Cody Nagel (@CodyNagel247) July 27, 2026

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