Bethune-Cookman vs UCF Game Preview: Three Former HBCU Players Suit Up for the Knights

Bethune-Cookman opens its 2026 season Thursday night with a trip up the road to Orlando, where the Wildcats face UCF at Acrisure Bounce House in a 7 p.m. kickoff streamed on ESPN+. Both programs enter at 0-0, but the game carries very different stakes on each sideline: for B-CU, it is a chance to end a series drought that stretches back to the first Bush administration, and for UCF, it is the first true test of a rebuild under a returning Scott Frost, one that includes three players on the two-deep who started their careers at HBCU programs.

Bethune-Cookman Enters Off Its Best Season Since Joining the SWAC

Head coach Raymond Woodie Jr. is entering his fourth season at B-CU coming off a 6-6 finish in 2025, the program’s best record since joining the SWAC. The Wildcats went 5-3 in conference play and a perfect 5-5 at home, and they closed the season by beating Florida A&M 38-34 in the Florida Blue Florida Classic at Camping World Stadium, the same building UCF’s series has occasionally been played in. That offense finished in the top 40 among FCS programs in scoring, passing, rushing, and passing efficiency.

B-CU returns 49 players from that roster, led by All-SWAC first-team picks in offensive lineman Christian Loving, linebacker Stephen Sparrow Jr., and long snapper Cole Hash. Defensive linemen Isaiah Washburn and Malik Stinnett and cornerback Naim Lassitter earned preseason second-team all-conference honors, and Lassitter is on the watch list for the Aenease Williams Award, given annually to the top defensive back in Division I HBCU football. Kicker Aiden Lanier is on the watch list for the Fred Mitchell Award, recognizing the top non-FBS placekicker in the country.

The one significant hole to fill is at quarterback. Both of last season’s primary passers, Cam’Ron Ransom and Timmy McClain, graduated, and Woodie has installed Florida A&M transfer Tyler Jefferson as the starter heading into the opener.

Three Former HBCU Players Are in UCF’s Two-Deep

UCF is coming off a difficult first season back under Frost, who returns to the program for a fourth season across two stints and a combined 24-14 record there, but finished 2025 at 5-7 overall and 2-7 in Big 12 play. The Knights are betting their 2026 turnaround on transfer quarterback Alonza Bernett III, who led James Madison to the College Football Playoff last season and was named Sun Belt Player of the Year after throwing for 2,806 yards and 23 touchdowns against eight interceptions while adding nearly 600 yards and 15 scores on the ground.

Defensive tackle Jeffson Lafontant played at Bethune-Cookman before transferring to UCF ahead of the 2025 season, and he is listed on UCF’s projected two-deep this week behind starter Thomas Collins, meaning he could see snaps against his former team Thursday night.

Lafontant is not the only Knight with HBCU roots on the depth chart. Projected starting center Connor Meadows began his college career at Tennessee State before a stop at Tennessee and is now in his second season at UCF. Long snapper Kyle Hicks arrived at UCF directly from Tennessee State this offseason and is listed as the starter at that spot in his first year with the program.

UCF returns its top three receivers: Duane Thomas Jr. and Walden Charles, and tight end Dylan Wade. However, the run game will look different behind transfers Duke Watson (Louisville) and Landen Chambers (Central Arkansas) after the Knights return only 95 rushing yards’ worth of production from last year’s backfield. The strength of the roster is a secondary that ranked 22nd nationally in passing yards allowed per game last season, its best mark since 2001, and returns four starters in cornerbacks Jayden Bellamy and Antoine Jackson, safety Demari Henderson, and nickel Braiden Marshall.

Records and results as reported in Bethune-Cookman and UCF athletics department game materials for the 2026 season opener.

A Series UCF Has Owned Since 1990

Thursday’s game is the 18th all-time meeting between the schools, and UCF has won the last eight in a row dating to 1990. B-CU’s only win in the series came in 1989, a 23-15 upset in Orlando. The most recent meeting, in 2021 at Acrisure Bounce House, was not close: UCF scored the game’s final 42 points after B-CU had tied it at 7 in the first quarter on a touchdown pass from Shannon Patrick to Darryl Powell Jr., and the Knights ran away for a 63-14 win in front of 38,443 fans.

A win Thursday would mean B-CU’s first victory over UCF since that 1989 game, its first season-opening win since a 36-15 win over Jackson State at the 2019 MEAC/SWAC Challenge, and back-to-back wins in the city of Orlando following the Florida Classic victory over Florida A&M. It would also be the first win over an FBS opponent of Woodie’s head coaching tenure and the program’s first over an FBS team since beating FIU in 2014.

This is B-CU’s third straight season opening in Florida, after road trips to FIU and Miami last year and to South Florida in 2023, part of a streak of eight consecutive seasons in which the Wildcats have opened with a road game against an in-state, non-conference opponent. After Thursday, B-CU returns to Daytona Stadium for four straight games, starting with a home opener against Stetson on Sept. 12, a homecoming matchup with Virginia-Lynchburg, and home dates against defending Celebration Bowl champion South Carolina State and SWAC preseason favorite Alabama State.