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This time at UCF, Scott Frost won’t need to catch lightning in a bottle

Published

7 months ago

May 5, 2025

Andrea AdelsonMay 5, 2025, 09:58 AM ET
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- ACC reporter.
- Joined ESPN.com in 2010.
- Graduate of the University of Florida.

ORLANDO, Fla. — Scott Frost walks into the UCF football building and into his office, the one he used the last time he had this job, eight years ago. The shades are drawn, just like they used to be. There are drawings from his three kids tacked to the walls. There are still trophies sitting on a shelf.

He still parks in the same spot before he walks into that same building and sits at the same desk. The only thing that has changed is that the desk is positioned in a different part of the room.

But the man doing all the same things at the University of Central Florida is a different Scott Frost than the one who left following that undefeated 2017 season to take the head coach job at Nebraska.

UCF might look the same, but the school is different now, too. The Knights are now in a Power 4 conference, and there is now a 12-team College Football Playoff that affords them the opportunity to play for national championships — as opposed to self-declaring them. Just outside his office, construction is underway to upgrade the football stadium. The same, but different.

“I know I’m a wiser person and smarter football coach,” Frost said during a sit-down interview with ESPN. “When you’re young, you think you have it all figured out. I don’t think you really get better as a person unless you go through really good things, and really bad things. I just know I’m where I’m supposed to be.”

Out on the practice field, Frost feels the most at home — he feels comfort in going back to the place that has defined nearly every day of his life. As a young boy, he learned the game from his mom and dad, both football coaches, then thrived as a college and NFL player before going into coaching.

He coaches up his players with a straightforwardness that quarterbacks coach McKenzie Milton remembers fondly from their previous time together at UCF. Milton started at quarterback on the 2017 undefeated team, and the two remained close after Frost left.

“I see the same version of him from when I was here as a player,” Milton said. “Even though the dynamic in college football has changed dramatically with the portal and NIL, I think Coach Frost is one of the few coaches that can still bring a group of guys together and turn them into a team, just with who he is and what he’s done and what he’s been through in his life. He knows what it looks like to succeed, both as a coach and a player.”

Since his return, Frost has had to adjust to those changes to college football, but he said, “I love coming into work every day. We’ve got the right kids who love football. We’re working them hard. They want to be pushed. They want to be challenged. We get to practice with palm trees and sunshine and, we’re playing big-time football. But it’s also just not the constant stress meat grinder of some other places.”

Meat grinder of some other places.

Might he mean a place such as Nebraska?

“You can think what you want,” Frost said. “One thing I told myself — I’m never going to talk about that. It just doesn’t feel good to talk about. I’ll get asked 100 questions. This is about UCF. I just don’t have anything to say.”

Frost says he has no regrets about leaving UCF, even though he didn’t get the results he had hoped for at his alma mater. When Nebraska decided to part ways with coach Mike Riley in 2017, Frost seemed the best, most obvious candidate to replace him. He had been the starting quarterback on the 1997 team, the last Nebraska team to win a national title.

He now had the coaching résumé to match. Frost had done the unthinkable at UCF — taking a program that was winless the season before he arrived, to undefeated and the talk of the college football world just two years later.

But he could not ignore the pull of Nebraska and the opportunities that came along with power conference football.

“I was so happy here,” Frost said. “We went undefeated and didn’t get a chance to win a championship, at least on the field. You are always striving to reach higher goals. I had always told myself I wasn’t going to leave here unless there was a place that you can legitimately go and win a national championship. It was a tough decision because I didn’t want to leave regardless of which place it was.”

Indeed, Frost maintains he was always happy at UCF. But he also knew returning to Nebraska would make others happy, too.

“I think I kind of knew that wasn’t best for me,” he said. “It was what some other people wanted me to do to some degree.”

In four-plus seasons with the Cornhuskers, Frost went 16-31 — including 5-22 in one-score games. He was fired three games into the 2022 season after a home loss to Georgia Southern.

After Frost was fired, he moved to Scottsdale, Arizona, where his wife has family. He reflected on what happened during his tenure with the Cornhuskers but also about what he wanted to do with the rest of his career. He tried to stay connected to the game, coaching in the U.S. Army Bowl, a high school all-star game in Frisco, Texas, in December 2022. Milton coached alongside him, and distinctly remembers a conversation they had.

“He said, ‘It’s my goal to get back to UCF one day,'” Milton said. “At that time, I was like, ‘I pray to God that happens.'”

If that was the ultimate goal, Frost needed to figure out how to position himself to get back there. While he contemplated his future, he coached his son’s flag football team to a championship. Frost found the 5- and 6-year-olds he coached “listen better than 19-year-olds sometimes.”

Ultimately, he decided on a career reboot in the NFL. Frost had visited the Rams during their offseason program, and when a job came open in summer 2024, Rams coach Sean McVay immediately reached out.

Frost was hired as a senior analyst, primarily helping with special teams but also working with offense and defense.

“It was more just getting another great leader in the building, someone who has been a head coach, that has wisdom and a wealth of experience to be able to learn from,” McVay told ESPN. “His ability to be able to communicate to our players from a great coaching perspective, but also have the empathy and the understanding from when he played — all of those things were really valuable.”

McVay said he and Frost had long discussions about handling the challenges that come with falling short as a head coach.

“There’s strength in the vulnerability,” McVay said. “I felt that from him. There’s a real power in the perspective that you have from those different experiences. If you can really look at some of the things that maybe didn’t go down the way you wanted to within the framework of your role and responsibility, real growth can occur. I saw that in him.”

Frost says his time with the Rams rejuvenated him.

“It brought me back,” Frost said. “Sometimes when you’re a head coach or maybe even a coordinator, you forget how fun it is to be around the game when it’s not all on you all the time. What I did was a very small part, and we certainly weren’t going to win or lose based on every move that I made, and I didn’t have to wear the losses and struggle for the victories like you do when you’re a head coach. I’m so grateful to those guys.”

UCF athletics director Terry Mohajir got a call from then-head coach Gus Malzahn last November. Malzahn, on the verge of finishing his fourth season at UCF, was contemplating becoming offensive coordinator at Florida State. Given all the responsibilities on his desk as head coach — from NIL to the transfer portal to roster management — he found the idea of going back to playcalling appealing. Mohajir started preparing a list of candidates and was told Thanksgiving night that Malzahn had planned to step down.

Though Frost previously worked at UCF under athletics director Danny White, he and Mohajir had a preexisting relationship. Mohajir said he reached out to Frost after he was fired at Nebraska to gauge his interest in returning to UCF as offensive coordinator under Malzahn. But Frost was not ready.

This time around, Mohajir learned quickly that Frost had interest in returning as head coach. Mohajir called McVay and Rams general manager Les Snead. They told him Frost did anything that was asked of him, including making copies around the office.

“They said, ‘You would never know he was the head coach at a major college program.” Mohajir also called former Nebraska athletic director Trev Alberts to get a better understanding about what happened with the Cornhuskers.

“Fits are a huge piece, and not everybody fits,” Mohajir said.

After eight conversations, Mohajir decided he wanted to meet Frost in person. They met at an airport hotel in Dallas.

“He was motivated,” Mohajir said. “We went from coast to coast, talked to coordinators, head coaches, pro guys, all kinds of different folks. And at the end of the day, I really believe that Scott wanted the job the most.”

The first day back in Orlando, Dec. 8, was a blur. Frost woke up at 3:45 a.m. in California to be able to make it to Florida in time for his introductory news conference with his family.

When they pulled into the campus, his first time back since he left in 2017, Frost said he was in a fog. It took another 24 hours for him and his wife, Ashley, to take a deep exhale.

“Rather than bouncing around chasing NFL jobs, we thought maybe we would be able to plant some roots here and have our kids be in a stable place for a while at a place that I really enjoyed coaching and that I think it has a chance to evolve into a place that could win a lot of football games,” Frost said. “All that together was just enough to get me to come back.”

The natural question now is whether Frost can do what he did during his first tenure.

That 2017 season stands as the only winning season of his head coaching career, but it carries so much weight with UCF fans because of its significance as both the best season in school history, and one that changed both its own future and college football.

After UCF finished 13-0, White self-declared the Knights national champions. Locked out of the four-team playoff after finishing No. 12 in the final CFP standings, White started lobbying for more attention to be paid to schools outside the power conferences.

That season also positioned UCF to pounce during the next wave of realignment. Sure enough, in 2023, the Knights began play in a Power 4 conference for the first time as Big 12 members. This past season, the CFP expanded to 12 teams. Unlike 2017, UCF now has a defined path to play for a national title and no longer has to go undefeated and then pray for a shot. Win the Big 12 championship, no matter the record, and UCF is in the playoff.

But Frost cautions those who expect the clock to turn back to 2017.

“I don’t think there’s many people out there that silly,” Frost said. “People joke about that with me, that they’re going to expect you go into undefeated in the first year. I think the fans are a little more realistic than that.”

The game, of course, is different. Had the transfer portal and NIL existed when Frost was at UCF during his first tenure, he might not have been able to keep the 2017 team together. The 2018 team, which went undefeated under Josh Heupel before losing to LSU in the Fiesta Bowl, might not have stayed together, either.

This upcoming season, UCF will receive a full share of television revenue from the Big 12, after receiving a half share (estimated $18 million) in each of his first two seasons. While that is more than what it received in the AAC, it is less than what other Big 12 schools received, making it harder to compete immediately. It also struggled with NIL funding. As a result, in its first two years in the conference, UCF went 5-13 in Big 12 play and 10-15 overall.

Assuming the House v. NCAA settlement goes into effect this summer, Mohajir says UCF is aiming to spend the full $20.5 million, including fully funding football.

“It’s like we moved to the fancy neighborhood, and we got a job that’s going to pay us money over time, and we’re going to do well over time, but we’re stretching a little to be there right now, and that requires a lot of effort from a lot of people and a lot of commitment from a lot of people,” Frost said. “So far, the help that we’ve gotten has been impressive.”

Mohajir points out that UCF has had five coaching changes over the past 10 years, dating back to the final season under George O’Leary in 2015, when the Knights went 0-12. Frost says he wants to be in for the long term, and Mohajir hopes consistency at head coach will be an added benefit. Mohajir believes UCF is getting the best of Frost in this moment and scoffs at any questions about whether rehiring him will work again.

“Based on what I’m seeing right now, it will absolutely work,” Mohajir said. “But I don’t really look at it as ‘working again.’ It’s not ‘again.’ It’s, ‘Will it work?’ Because it’s a different era.”

To that end, Frost says success is not recreating 2017 and going undefeated. Rather, Frost said, “If our group now can help us become competitive in the Big 12, and then, from time to time, compete for championships and make us more relevant nationally, I think we’ll have done our job to help catapult UCF again.”

You could say he is looking for the same result. He’s just taking a different route there.

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The Clemson Insider

Published

15 minutes ago

December 13, 2025

Your Sports Nation

CLEMSON — While Clemson continues to prepare to play Penn State in the Pinstripe Bowl on Dec. 27, there are things happening inside the program that will help shape what takes place next year.

The next month is going to be the most important month Dabo Swinney’s program will have in a very long time.

Why?

There is a lot going on, whether it be through the transfer portal, NIL or coaching. There are a lot of moving parts right now and it is all important to next year’s team.

Though Swinney will not talk about next year’s team until this season is over, we can.

As we have reported, there are and there will be more changes to the coaching staff. There will also be more changes to the personnel.

The transfer portal officially opens on Jan. 2, and, as you know, several Tigers have already given their intentions to enter the portal. Four underclassmen have declared for the NFL Draft, as well.

Clemson welcomes 19 freshmen to the team, most of them will enroll in January. However, the Tigers will have two weeks to bring in some more talent from the portal.

How Swinney and the coaching staff attack the portal will be paramount to the 2026 team’s success?

It has been well documented Clemson has not handled the NIL and portal as well as other schools. You only need to look at the four previous seasons to see what I am talking about.

Since 2021, the Tigers are 37-16 (.698) with one College Football Playoff appearance. Granted, the Tigers did win ACC Championships in 2022 and ’24, but it is obvious the program has slipped a notch in this new era of college football.

Can the Tigers reach the top of the mountain, again?

I am not sure.

Let’s be honest, the NIL has hurt Clemson. Part of that is Clemson’s fault, part of that is just the way things are. It’s hard for Clemson to compete in the third-party NIL world with schools that can. That is one reason why the Tigers cannot sign 5-star prospects anymore.

While Clemson continues to struggle with the NIL, other schools within the ACC, continue to have success. ACC Champion Duke is a perfect example of this.

Before the NIL, Duke was irrelevant in football and there was no way they could compete with the Clemson’s and Florida State’s. These days, the Blue Devils own a two-game win streak against the Tigers.

Why?

Because they are more successful with the NIL.

Virginia is another example. Tony Elliott went to the portal and pulled 30 new players on a team that made it to the ACC Championship Game. He used revenue sharing and NIL funds to get the best players he could.

As we mentioned before, the changes in college football are very reminiscent of how new rules in college baseball affected the Clemson baseball program some 15 years ago. Clemson baseball has never fully recovered.

Will Clemson Football?

To do that, Clemson must change its philosophy when it comes to paying players from the portal.

This is like free agency in the NFL. You must go and pay for the best.

You must do what is best for the program, not worry if you hurt the feelings of a current player on the roster.

Look at it this way, Clemson is losing, potentially, three first-round picks—Peter Woods, Avieon Terrell and T.J. Parker—and one second-round pick in Antonio Williams. Those guys are all underclassmen. Who are the Tigers replacing them with?

Let me ask you this. How many first-round picks will next year’s roster have?

This is an important off-season. Swinney must make the right choices in the portal.

The Tigers cannot afford to go 4-4 in the ACC again, which is possible if you look at next year’s schedule.

Clemson will play Georgia Tech, Miami, North Carolina and Virginia at home in 2026. As well as visit California, Duke, Florida State and Syracuse. Look at that schedule, do you think the Tigers, with the current roster, can win the ACC next season?

This is why the next month is going to be so big for the Clemson Football program.

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Oregon WR Dakorien Moore signs NIL deal with Red Bull

Published

1 hour ago

December 13, 2025

Your Sports Nation

Dec. 12, 2025, 10:38 a.m. PT

College football has always been an expansive and complex entity and it has shifted even further in that direction in recent years with the introduction of NIL deals and the expansion of the transfer portal. Oddly enough, it is those same alterations that play a part in the Oregon Ducks becoming such an attractive destination.

They landed five-star wide receiver Dakorien Moore last recruiting cycle and he has been everything that the school and scouts hoped he would be. He is dealing with a knee injury currently, but he had recorded 443 yards and three touchdowns in just eight games before his stellar season was disrupted.

Moore has been so impressive that reports surfaced yesterday that he is signing an NIL deal with Red Bull, an energy drink manufacturer. No details have emerged about how much it is worth, but the true freshman wideout added yet another partnership to an already strong package of NIL contracts.

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Sen. Ted Cruz Talks College Sports, Prop Bets, And Sen. Kennedy One-Liners

Published

2 hours ago

December 13, 2025

Your Sports Nation

Senator Ted Cruz joined OutKick’s Dan Dakich for a wide-ranging interview that touched on everything from saving college sports to making sure betting on prop bets doesn’t lead to corruption of integrity to the one-liners of Louisiana Sen. John Kennedy.

As I said, wide-ranging, and you can check out the interview in its entirety on the Don’t @ Me with Dan Dakich YouTube channel.

One of the biggest stories in sports these days has to do with the state of college sports and how it has been impacted by NIL. Sen. Cruz talked about how, while it’s good that athletes can make some money off of their name, image, and likeness, the bidding wars we see are going to threaten the existence of college sports.

There’s An Absolute Crisis In College Sports | Don’t @ Me w/ Dan Dakich

“So look, I think there’s an absolute crisis in college sports. I think the current situation [is] the Wild West,” the Republican senator from Texas said. “Every school is in a bidding war. It keeps going up and up and up. With the transfer portal, you’ve got people jumping from school to school to school, and I don’t think any of this is good for college schools.

“I think we’re on a path where, if Congress doesn’t act, we’re going to see a handful of schools, maybe 30 [or] 40, schools that are ‘super schools’ that survive… But a whole bunch of other schools on the current path — I think division two schools, division three schools, and even a bunch of division one schools — this bidding war is pricing them out of being competitive. That’s not good for sports.”

Cruz also talked about how sports that don’t typically earn income for their schools are going to be in a lot of danger because of the current system, and how that could take away incredible opportunities for those student-athletes.

“I’m really worried about all the kids that this is their only hope to get an education,” Sen. Cruz said. “To learn the discipline and teamwork and all the skills you get playing sports that then help you in life, help you get a job, help you build a business, help you provide for your family. And so I think there is an urgent need for Congress to step in.”

Another major issue impacting sports that Dakich and Sen. Cruz discussed has to do with sports gambling. Specifically, prop bets and how easy it can be for players to manipulate them, thereby threatening the integrity of the game.

Sen. Cruz: Prop Bets = Corruption Waiting to Happen | Don’t @ Me w/ Dan Dakich

“I can tell you, I’ve recently sent oversight letters to the NBA and Major League Baseball inquiring, getting the facts about how many, how many complaints I’m particularly concerned about prop bets,” Sen. Cruz said. “If you can bet on whether the first pitch in a game is going to be a ball or a strike, well, you know what? The pitcher can’t necessarily guarantee it’s a strike, but 100% of the time, he can guarantee it’s a ball, and that just invites corruption.”

Sen. Cruz mentioned that he has talked to leagues and gambling platforms about this issue and is exploring ways Congress might be able to help maintain the integrity of games.

“I don’t think anyone wants to see sports where you don’t trust the outcome, where you think it’s rigged, where you have an athlete throwing a game because he wants to make a buck,” the senator said. “That’s a bad outcome, and I do think we need to work to prevent it.”

And finally, Dakich and Cruz hit on a lighter topic, and those are the legendary one-liners of Louisiana Republican Sen. John Kennedy.

“That judiciary committee hearing where John Kennedy leaned forward into the microphone and he says, ‘Christmas tree ornaments and Jeffrey Epstein: two things you know, didn’t hang themselves.'” Sen. Cruz recalled. “I always fell out of my chair. I’m like, Wait, how was that out loud?”

How great is that? It would’ve made a perfect Carnac joke back in the day.

Dakich then mentioned that one of his favorite Sen. Kennedy lines, “She’s not the dumbest person in the country, but she better hope the dumbest person doesn’t die.”

“John is essentially a stand–up comedian,” Sen. Cruz said, before bringing up an all-time Kennedy gem. “He said things like ‘AOC is why they put instructions on shampoo.’”

…

Be sure to check out the entire interview on the Don’t @ Me with Dan Dakich YouTube channel.

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Rodriguez collects Bednarik Award for fifth national honor

Published

3 hours ago

December 13, 2025

Your Sports Nation

LUBBOCK, Texas – Texas Tech senior linebacker Jacob Rodriguez collected his fifth national award this season Friday evening as he was tabbed the winner of the Bednarik Award during the College Football Awards Show live on ESPN.

Rodriguez is the first Red Raider in program history to win the Bednarik Award, which is presented annually by the Maxwell Football Club to the nation’s top defensive player. The Bednarik Award selected Rodriguez over Ohio State safety Caleb Downs and Texas A&M defensive end Cashius Howell.

With the addition of the Bednarik Award, Rodriguez is now the winner of the Butkus Award (nation’s top linebacker), the Bronko Nagurski Trophy (nation’s top defensive player), the Lombardi Award (nation’s top lineman or linebacker) and the Pony Express Award (nation’s top duo with David Bailey) this season alone. He is the third player in history to win the Butkus Award as well as the Nagurski Trophy and Bednarik Award in the same season, joining Miami’s Dan Morgan (2000) and Notre Dame’s Manti Te’o (2012). Rodriguez joins Te’o as the only players to also win the Lombardi Award.

Rodriguez, who was also tabbed a first team All-American by the Walter Camp Foundation during the ESPN broadcast, has bolstered one of the nation’s top defenses, leading the Red Raiders to their first Big 12 title in program history this season and their first appearance in the College Football Playoff. The Red Raiders enter a potential matchup with either No. 5 Oregon or No. 12 seed James Madision at 12-1 overall, marking the most wins in program history.

Rodriguez has now led Texas Tech to four-consecutive bowl appearances during his career after going from a scholarship quarterback at Virginia, to walk-on linebacker with the Red Raiders and now a national award winner. He was joined during the ESPN College Football Awards Show by his parents, Joe and Ann Rodriguez, and his wife, Emma.

Rodriguez enters bowl season as the FBS leader with seven forced fumbles and ranks among the top-15 players nationally with 117 tackles. He is the first FBS player since 2005 to record at least five forced fumbles, two fumble recoveries and four interceptions all in the same season. His impact has bolstered a Texas Tech defense that leads the nation with 31 takeaways and ranks third nationally in scoring defense at 10.9 points per game. Rodriguez was responsible for nine takeaways himself — all in Big 12 play – thanks to his ability to punch the ball out and also read the quarterback in coverage.

Rodriguez is currently the highest-rated player in all of college football, according to Pro Football Focus, grading out at 93.3 overall so far this season. He is the top-rated player in the country in terms of rush defense, receiving a 95.5 grade in that area for a Red Raider defense that is easily the nation’s best in stopping opponents on the ground. Texas Tech is giving up only 68.5 rushing yards a game thanks to Rodriguez, who also ranks fifth nationally in coverage with a 92.3 grade.

Established in 1995, the Chuck Bednarik Award is one of the most-prestigious honors in college football, awarded annually to the most outstanding defensive player. This accolade recognizes exceptional talent, tenacity and impact on the defensive side of the ball. The award is named in tribute to Chuck Bednarik, a revered figure in football history known for his remarkable career as a linebacker.

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Oddsmakers like Ohio State over Indiana to win College Football Playoff – The Daily Hoosier

Published

4 hours ago

December 13, 2025

Your Sports Nation

Although Indiana just beat Ohio State on a neutral field to win the Big Ten Championship, the Hoosiers are a consensus underdog to the Buckeyes when it comes to winning the national title.

Surveying six different online gambling sites — Bet365, MGM, DraftKings, Caesers, FanDuel and Bet Rivers — Indiana has the second-best odds as of Friday morning at each outlet to win the 2025 national championship. Ohio State has the consensus best odds, and Georgia the third-best.

The consensus national champion odds at Action Network has Ohio State at +222, Indiana at +280, and Georgia at +550.

Indiana is the No. 1 team in the College Football Playoff, AP Top-25, and Coaches Poll. The Hoosiers beat Ohio State for the first time since 1988 on Saturday in Indianapolis.

Ohio State would likely have to beat Georgia in the national semifinal to reach the national championship game. Indiana would likely have to beat either Oregon or Texas Tech, the teams with the fourth and fifth-best odds, respectively.

Against its potential quarterfinal round opponents at the Rose Bowl on Jan. 1, Indiana is around a 6.5-point favorite over Alabama, and a 9.5-point favorite over Oklahoma.

Here is the official 2025-26 College Football Playoff bracket