GREENVILLE, N.C. — For the second straight week, Dillon Gabriel and No. 13 UCF had no problem running their fast-tempo offense and rolling to big offensive totals.

• Dillon Gabriel threw for 408 yards and 4 touchdowns in a 51-28 win over East Carolina
• UCF has scored 100 points in its first two games of the season
• The Knights make their home debut next week vs. Tulsa

The Knights just need to start cleaning up some of their penalties, too.

Gabriel threw for 408 yards and four touchdowns to help UCF beat East Carolina 51-28 on Saturday, winning its American Athletic Conference opener for the fifth straight season in a game marked by the Knights’ offensive brilliance and its early trouble with pre-snap penalties.

“You never play a perfect game but we came out (and) we put 51 points up,” Gabriel said.

UCF (2-0, 1-0) rolled to 632 total yards after amassing 660 in its opener, getting huge performances from receivers Jaylon Robinson and Marlon Williams. But there were also 19 penalties for 139 yards, 10 coming in the opening quarter with seven of those false-start flags.

That included the bizarre sequence of the Knights having four straight false starts while trying to get off their first offensive snap. Yet, as Gabriel noted, the Knights went from a 1st-and-30 from their own 5-yard line to scoring on that drive anyway on Greg McCrae’s short TD run.

The Knights soon settled in and blew the game open with a pair of touchdowns in the final 5 minutes before halftime.

“I’m proud of the guys, everyone played really well — and, there’s still a lot to fix,” Gabriel said. “You can see what we do and without some penalties, without just minor things we’ve got to fix, I think the ceiling is extremely high.”

Holton Ahlers threw for 215 yards and three TDs for the Pirates (0-1, 0-1), who were making a delayed start to the season after coronavirus-related scheduling changes. And it came in an essentially empty Dowdy-Ficklen Stadium due to COVID-19 protocols, with only a smattering of player family members in attendance.

But after a game-opening TD drive, the Pirates lost fumbles on their side of the 50 on three consecutive first-quarter possessions. They didn’t make it back to the end zone until the Knights led 41-7 early in the third.

By the time it was over, the school said the Pirates had come within 2 yards of matching the most allowed in any season opener in program history.

“Really had an opportunity to get some control of the ballgame and had three turnovers,” Pirates coach Mike Houston said. “You have three turnovers there in the first quarter, to where you’re around midfield, you’ve got a chance to stick the ball in again, to take control of the game, to get a lead on what everybody regards as the best team in our league.

“And those mistakes, you just can’t keep making them.”