Gus Malzahn breaks down first year in Big 12, how close team is

In his first year in the Big 12, UCF coach Gus Malzahn found the going a little tougher than he expected. His team finished just 6-7 on the year, falling in the Gasparilla Bowl to end with a losing record.

It was the first time in Malzahn’s history as a head coach at the high school or college level that he had finished with a losing record.

What did he learn?

“First of all there’s a lot of real teams,” Malzahn said on the Andy Staples On3 show. “In the past there is that misconception that it was a seven-on-seven league. It was anything but that. Teams line up, they try to bloody your nose. It’s a real conference.”

UCF was streaky throughout the season. The team started off by winning three straight, then dropped its next five games. It won three of its next four before dropping the bowl game.

Many of those games were close, but the Knights didn’t quite have enough firepower to pull them out.

What Malzahn learned more than anything is that there’s never a chance to catch your breath during the season. You better be ready to bring it each and every week.

“There’s no off weeks. And there’s a lot of parity,” he said. “You have to play good football to win, whether you’re at home or on the road. But I was very impressed going through it the first year.”

So is there anything that Malzahn can take away from the first year?

“You learn the first year, there’s no doubt,” Gus Malzahn said. “And just to be completely honest, we didn’t do a great job coaching. Any time you have that many close losses, we lost a couple close at home, you just talked about the Oklahoma (game), you’ve got a chance to seize the moment in a huge win, we weren’t able to do that. But I like where we’re at.”

UCF lost to Oklahoma by just two points, a 31-29 defeat. It also lost to Baylor by just a point, at 36-35. So too, with Texas Tech, at 24-23.

Finding a way over that hump next year could result in a big change of fortunes for the new Big 12 member.

“Definitely did some self-reflection. But when you do that it gives you an opportunity to, ‘Hey, what do we need to do?’ And we evaluate everything,” Gus Malzahn said. “We made some coordinator changes, some staff changes, I really think that’s going to help us. We brought in some defensive playmakers from the portal that I think can help with our young guys coming up, so I like where we’re at. But we’re going to roll our sleeves up and go to work.”