The UCF Knights have hired a familiar face as their next head coach. The program will welcome back former head coach Scott Frost to be their next head coach and replace Gus Malzahn.
Malzahn left to become the offensive coordinator at Florida State after a second-straight season of not meeting expectations with the Knights two years into the program joining the Big 12 Conference.
UCF made it official on social media on Saturday night.
Most recently, Frost has been serving as a coaching consultant for Sean McVay and the LA Rams. Frost will return to UCF on a five-year contract.
Scott Frost was the head coach at UCF for two seasons, in 2016 and 2017, going 6-7 his first year, before going 13-0 in his season second, including a win in the Peach Bowl. After that season, Frost left for the Nebraska job, where a bunch of close losses during his career ended his tenure as a head coach early in the 2022 season after a 1-2 start. He finished his career at Nebraska with a 16-31 record, including going 10-26 in Big Ten play.
Malzahn won nine games in each of his first two years in Orlando after taking over for Josh Heupel, who left for Tennessee. But the last two seasons in the Big 12 have not gone as planned. UCF went 6-7 last season, including some close losses. And with plenty of talent on the roster, the Knights were a trendy dark horse pick in the Big 12. But the Knights went 4-8 overall and 2-7 in Big 12 play.
UCF’s Historic 2017 Season Under Scott Frost
The Knights finished the regular season 12–0, the football program’s first ever undefeated regular season and second 12-win season, and won the 2017 American Conference Championship. The Knights season wrapped the season playing in a 2018 Peach Bowl and beating Auburn. The effort came just two years after an 0–12 winless season in 2015. UCF became the first team in the history of NCAA Division I FBS to improve from a winless regular season to an undefeated regular season in only two years.
Despite being the only undefeated team in FBS, UCF did not receive a spot in the College Football Playoff. Frost criticized the College Football Playoff committee, saying that the Knights “deserve[d] more credit from the committee than what they got.” Frost believed that the committee deliberately ranked the Knights low enough on a weekly basis that they had no realistic chance of finishing in the top four for a spot in the CFP.
Well, now being in the Big 12 with a 12-Team Playoff, Frost has a chance to right the wrongs from nearly a decade ago.
