Scott Frost

Central Florida head coach Scott Frost reacts and shouts at a sideline Saturday.

(Tony Ding | AP)

ANN ARBOR -- Scott Frost went down swinging Saturday.

Despite his Central Florida squad dropping a 51-14 decision to host Michigan, Frost -- UCF's first-year coach -- had some strong words about his team and how he believed it performed against the Wolverines inside Michigan Stadium.

"It's hard to say when the score is what it is, but we came in here and outhit those guys today," Frost said. "Standing on the sideline, there was no doubt who was hitting harder. Our guys came in hungry and wanting to do that. It's rare you can come into Michigan and rush for 300 yards on them. They had to run a fly sweep in the fourth quarter to get to 100.

"I give our defense a ton of credit ... there's a lot to fix but there's also a lot to really be excited about."

The Knights finished Saturday's game with 275 yards on 46 carries, 87 of them coming on one rush by freshman running back Adrian Killins. Michigan, meanwhile, ran the ball 41 times for 119 yards.

Asked about the rushing numbers by his offense after the game, Jim Harbaugh explained how Central Florida loaded the box and brought run blitzes for most of the day -- which allowed Michigan to open things up through the air.

That's exactly what happened, of course, as Wilton Speight finished 25 of 37 for 312 yards and 4 touchdowns.

Frost, though, wanted to focus elsewhere.

"Jim Harbaugh's teams are physical, that's what he's known for. We came in here and rushed for 6 yards a carry against them," he explained. "They had 2.9 yards rushing. That tells me our guys are playing hard and fighting. That's really what I wanted to see today.

"There was no lull. We outhit them in the first half, I thought we outhit them in the second half. They've got a lot of playmakers and they made a bunch of plays. But standing on the sideline, watching the impacts and watching the collisions and watching the line move, I thought we won that battle."

And just to prove he wasn't done, Frost concluded his six-minute press availability by being asked why his team wasn't on the field for the national anthem prior to kickoff.

UCF appeared to be still walking down the tunnel when the anthem began to play -- Michigan had already been on the field for several minutes.

But Frost said his team wasn't allowed to take its own sideline.

"They wouldn't let us out there and there wasn't any room on our sideline anyway. Would've loved to have been out there," he said. "There was a hundred people on our sideline, they held us in the tunnel."