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The Central Florida Knights defense shut down the high-powered Marshall Thundering Herd offense with four sacks of quarterback Rakeem Cato and 10 hurries in a 54-17 victory on Saturday night. Even more impressive was the fact that while the Thundering Herd ran 98 plays on offense, they were held 200 yards below their season average, holding them to 66 yards rushing, well under their average of 260 yards they have ran in previous conference games.
Jonathan Davis led the defense with nine total tackles, six solo and a sack against an offensive line that had allowed just 11 sacks the entire season before Saturday. In an interview with the Orlando Sentinel, Davis said that "we just played good all the way around."
The defense also held Cato to a 53.8 completion percentage, 17 points down from his season average. The Knights are now 6-2 on the season, 4-0 in Conference USA and lead the conference's East Division by a half-game over the East Carolina Pirates. The Knights next play against the SMU Mustangs on Saturday night. The game is scheduled to kickoff at 7 p.m. and will be broadcast on the CBS Sports Network.