How The UCF Knights Could Ruin Oklahoma State's' Season in 2026
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Based on the schedule, the Oklahoma State Cowboys should be well rested when they face the UCF Knights this season.
The Cowboys will play each of the first four weeks of the regular season, facing Tulsa, Oregon, Murray State and then opening the Big 12 slate at West Virginia on Sept. 26 before they get their only bye week.
After that, the Cowboys will host the Knights at Boone Pickens Stadium. The Cowboys and the Knights have only played each other twice and both games were in Orlando.
Oklahoma State, if it is unable to beat West Virginia, will eye UCF as an opportunity to finally end what would be at that point a 19-game Big 12 Conference losing streak.
But could the Knights use that opportunity to ruin Oklahoma State season? It's possible.
How UCF Can Ruin Oklahoma State’s Season
On paper this should be a good matchup for Oklahoma State. The Knights have been in the Big 12 for three years and they've never won more than six games in a season. That was their debut in 2023 under Gus Malzahn when they went 6-7 (3-6 in Big 12 play).
Each of the past two seasons UCF has only won two league games, and that includes the return of Scott Frost as head coach last season. The Knights lost to BYU in the season’s final week and failed to reach a bowl game. But when they played OSU the weekend before they still had a shot at a bowl game and beat the Cowboys, 17-14.
By that point, Oklahoma State had no path to a bowl game and was simply trying to avoid a second straight winless Big 12 season. The Cowboys failed to avoid that.
Both Oklahoma State and UCF enter this season striving for the same thing — respectability. OSU’s conference losing streak is an embarrassment and it's the reason Mike Gundy is no longer the head coach. Well, it’s one of several reasons.
Frost led the Knights to incredible heights during his first stint, but the program hasn't been quite the same since he and then Josh Heupel left. Frost saw his reputation tarnished at Nebraska, and he's looking for some redemption. Both teams have something to play for. So how does UCF ruin Oklahoma State’s season with a win?
Yes, winning the game would ruin Oklahoma State’s return home after a Big 12 opener and a bye week. But a loss to UCF, given the circumstances, might be harder to deal with. The Cowboys are supposed to be one of the old guard teams in the Big 12. UCF has been in the league for only three years. Dropping this game, no matter what happens at West Virginia, would cut deep.
Win at WVU and then lose to UCF and the Cowboys lose the confidence they built in Morgantown and fueled by a bye week.
Lost at WVU and then lose to UCF and the Cowboys run their Big 12 losing streak to 20 games and the crisis of confidence really could start to set in.
New OSU coach Eric Morris likely has higher ambitions than a bowl game. But all things considered that is an attainable goal. But a loss to UCF would damage those hopes, especially if it’s along the lines of the result of the first game the two teams played in Orlando in 2023 — UCF 45, Oklahoma State 3.
The Cowboys hope it doesn’t come to that.
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Matthew Postins is the publisher of Oklahoma State on SI. He is an award-winning sports journalist who was formerly the editor of the College Football America Yearbook and covers the Big 12 Conference for Heartland College Sports.
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