Box Score West Virginia's defense came up with four UCF turnovers and Garrett Greene ran for three touchdowns to lead the Mountaineers to an 41-28 victory over the Knights Saturday afternoon at FBC Mortgage Stadium in Orlando, Florida.
 
Greene, who completed 14-of-23 passes for 156 yards, added 55 yards on the ground to become the first WVU quarterback to run for at least three touchdowns in a game since Pat White did it against Louisville in 2008.
 
The Mountaineer ground game took advantage of a UCF run defense that came into today's game ranked 120^th in the country, allowing 196 yards per game. That figure is now worse after WVU ran 50 times for 286 yards with all five of its touchdowns coming on the ground.

It is the first time WVU has had five rushing touchdowns in a game since September 17, 2022 vs Towson (six) in a 65-7 win. It is also the first time WVU has had five rushing TDs in a Big 12 game since September 23, 2017 vs Kansas.
 
WVU also benefited from three John Rhys Plumlee interceptions, two going to cornerback Beanie Bishop, and a Plumlee fumble that resulted in 21 points.
 
"I just did what I was supposed to do on those," Bishop said afterward. "We knew that it was going to take takeaways for us to be able to win the ballgame, and we had four takeaways today. That's some of the things we got away from in losing the last two games so we knew we had to get the ball and give it back to the offense."
 
CJ Donaldson Jr. went over the 100-yard mark for the second time this season, gaining a season-high 121 yards, and the Mountaineer defense limited the Knights to just 27 yards rushing in the second half and 189 for the game – 57 below their season average.
 
"We just went through two really hard games. You lose on the last play and then what happened to us in the fourth quarter, I just felt it in our team meeting on Tuesday morning and our guys came out and really competed today," West Virginia coach Neal Brown said. "It's hot, we're not very deep especially in some defensive areas, and we were able to overcome some injuries. That just speaks really well of our staff, support areas and our kids."
 
West Virginia (5-3, 3-2) scored on its first three possessions of the first half and took a 17-14 lead into the locker room at intermission.
 
On the opening possession, Brown gambled on fourth and 1 at West Virginia's 45 and Donaldson responded with a 21-yard run down the near sideline to the UCF 34. A Greene 19-yard pass to Devin Carter took the ball to the UCF 6, and Greene did the rest running up the middle.
 
The Mountaineers' other first-half touchdown was the result of a 10-play, 64-yard drive that was set up by Bishop's interception at the WVU 2-yard line that he returned to the 37.
 
A couple of Greene 14-yard passes to Carter and Kole Taylor helped get the ball to the UCF 10, where Jahiem White did the rest on two carries, the second from the 4 for his second rushing touchdown of the season.
 
In between, Michael Hayes booted a 24-yard field goal with 2:01 left in the first quarter to cap a 10-play, 71-yard drive. West Virginia got the ball to the UCF 6, but Greene, under heavy pressure, was unable to hook up with Traylon Ray on his third-down pass.
 
Rhys Plumlee was responsible for UCF's two first-half scores, the first a 34-yard pass down the near sideline to Kobe Hudson and the second an 8-yard jaunt into the end zone.
 
Another Bishop interception resulted in more points for West Virginia to begin the third quarter. His pick and return from the WVU 12 to the 32 gave the Mountaineers good field position on their opening offensive possession of the second half.
 
After a Donaldson third-down conversion run, Preston Fox took a wide receiver screen 28 yards to the UCF 29. A Greene 9-yard pass and then a 7-yard run got the ball to the 13 where he finished the drive with two more runs, the scoring jaunt coming from the 7. Hayes' conversion kick made the score 24-14.
 
It took UCF just 3:36 to answer. Plumlee was 5-for-5 for 72 yards on the drive, including a back-shoulder pass to Baker in the corner of the end zone for a 7-yard touchdown. Replay review confirmed Baker got one foot down before falling out of bounds.
 
A fourth UCF turnover put West Virginia in business again. A blitzing Lee Kpogba hit Plumlee from behind and his fumble was recovered by Jalen Thornton at the Knights' 27. Greene ran 21 yards to the 6, Donaldson ran twice to the 1 and then Greene took it in from there.
 
After forcing the Knights' first punt of the game, West Virginia tacked on seven more with 9:29 left in the fourth quarter. White's 32-yard run moved the ball to the UCF 34 and then EJ Horton came up with a fourth-down catch for 13 yards to the 13. A wide receiver screen to Fox nearly ended the drive when the football was jarred loose after he caught it, but offensive guard Tomas Rimac alertly jumped on the ball at the 6. On the next play, Donaldson walked in for WVU's fifth rushing touchdown of the afternoon.
 
A fourth-down stop gave the Mountaineers the ball at UCF's 32, but West Virginia was unable to deliver the knockout blow. It appeared White delivered it, scoring from 13 yards out on third and 4, but both tight ends were called for holding on the play, which moved the ball back to the 31. Here, Hayes kicked a 41-yard field goal to make the score 41-21.
 
The Knights (3-5, 0-5) tacked on a late score when Plumlee flipped a 16-yard touchdown pass to Hudson with 1:46 left.
 
Plumlee was 25-of-36 for 274 yards and three touchdowns and RJ Harvey finished with 100 yards on 14 carries.
 
White contributed 85 yards on just nine carries for the Mountaineers.
 
"You are going to look at the stats and you are going to see that last week we lost the point differential on turnovers 17-0 and this week we reversed that and won the game," Brown said.
 
Today's victory ended West Virginia's losing streak at two and extended UCF's losing streak to five straight games in its inaugural Big 12 season. The Knights' have consecutive losses to Kansas State, Baylor, Kansas, Oklahoma and now today.

The Mountaineers are now 3-0 against the Knights, including a pair of victories in Orlando. It was WVU's first conference road game in the Eastern Time Zone since it played in the Big East Conference in 2011.
 
West Virginia returns to Milan Puskar Stadium to take on BYU next Saturday. A game time is forthcoming.
 
UCF will seek its first conference victory next week at Cincinnati, another Big 12 newcomer seeking its first win.