The Knights ' most prominent current football rivals are conference foes East Carolina and Tulsa , and former Conference USA rival Marshall . UCF 's main in-state rival is South Florida . For most of the rivalry 's existence , it was an inter-conference contest when South Florida was in the Big East and UCF in C-USA . Both schools are now conference members in The American and play on Black Friday each year
Big East
Big East Conference (1979–2013)
UCF Knights