Caden Piening is giving UCF exactly what it wants from a young tight end: steady production now, and a ceiling that has Scott Frost thinking bigger.
The redshirt freshman has turned a strong camp into a breakout season with the Knights, carving out a starting role next to Dylan Wade and looking more and more like a long-term piece of UCF’s offense. Through that rise, he’s shown he can handle the dirty work as a blocker and still hurt defenses in the passing game, with four catches for 60 yards and a touchdown.
That score came in UCF’s 21-13 win over TCU last Saturday, and it was the kind of play that shows why the coaching staff is so high on him. Piening ran up the seam, Keyone Jenkins fired the ball in before the defense could fully react, and even after TCU defenders closed fast to keep him out of the end zone, Piening stretched the ball across the goal line.
His growth has come after a stop-and-start beginning to his college career. Piening had some limited success as a freshman, then injuries forced him to redshirt. Since then, he’s used spring and fall camp to win the job and keep it.
After the game, Piening said he watched film on former Knights tight end Jordan Akins, the player Frost coached during his first stint at UCF. That comparison matters because Akins set a serious standard in Orlando, and Frost made it clear Monday that he sees real NFL potential in Piening.
Frost said he has a "really high seeing" for the young tight end and added that people are starting to see what he can do. He also drew a direct line to Akins while making the point that Piening still has work ahead of him.
"He's still got a ways to go to catch Akins," Frost said during Monday's press conference. "He played in the league for a long time and was a really good player, and I think Caden can get there."
Akins’ UCF run gave the program one of its best modern tight end seasons. He was a major part of the undefeated 2017 team, catching 32 passes for 515 yards and four touchdowns and earning First Team All-ACC honors.
After that season, he entered the 2018 NFL Draft and became one of the Knights in the league when the Houston Texans took him with the 98th pick in the third round, the highest tight end selection in program history. Akins signed a four-year, $3.32 million deal that included a signing bonus of $761,520.
He contributed right away in the NFL, putting together 53 catches for 643 yards and two touchdowns across his first two seasons. Those were his best years, before he became a journeyman in 2022.
That’s the path Piening is being measured against now, and he still has time to build his own version of it. With several seasons left in Frost’s offense, he looks like Wade’s successor once Wade moves on, and UCF has every reason to believe the tight end room is in good hands.
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UCFs Big 12 Statement Put Gus Malzahns Recruiting In Focus
UCFs Big 12 home opener against TCU offered a pretty clear reminder that roster building matters as much as game planning. The Knights got major contributions from several players brought in during the Gus Malzahn era, and those arrivals showed up on both sides of the ball in a win that felt as much about depth and development as it did about one nights execution.
The defensive tone was set early by Braeden Marshall, who helped swing momentum with a first-drive fumble recovery and then kept making plays as the night went on. On offense, Taevion Swint found the end zone on the ground and Caden Piening added a touchdown catch, while Demari Henderson added pressure with a sack to go along with the ball-hawking production he had already shown before. It was the kind of performance that put UCFs recruiting footprint in the spotlight, even as the bigger picture of what it means for the program keeps coming into focus. [Read more 🡒]
BYU May Be Getting A Much Different UCF Than Expected
UCF has spent much of this season looking like a far different team on one side of the ball, and that matters now with a run of ranked opponents on deck. The Knights have leaned on a defense that has been one of the leagues better scoring units, a sharp contrast to an offense that has lingered near the bottom of the Big 12 in yardage. For a team trying to stay afloat in conference play, that defensive backbone has become the reason the season still feels alive.
The challenge now is that the schedule does not give UCF much breathing room before BYU arrives. The Knights have to navigate back-to-back road trips first, and the way they handle those games will say plenty about what kind of test awaits the Cougars in Orlando. If the defense keeps holding up the way it has, BYU may be walking into a much tougher matchup than expected. [Read more 🡒]
UCF Just Earned Momentum And October Will Test Everything
UCF finally got a Big 12 breakthrough with its win over TCU, a result that offered some immediate relief and a little proof that the Knights can survive in this league. But the calendar is about to get a lot less forgiving, and head coach Scott Frost along with several players have already acknowledged that the stretch ahead will tell a much bigger story about where this team really stands.
October brings a run that will demand more than one encouraging afternoon, with the Knights staring at ranked opponents and the kind of road pressure that has bothered them before. The quarterback picture adds another layer, too, with Alonza Barnett III still sidelined and Keyone Jenkins set to keep the offense moving at Houston, where UCF will have to show the TCU win was a step forward and not just a brief pause in the grind. [Read more 🡒]