Alright folks, new week, new Keys to Victory.  By now you may be seeing a trend with these articles, and that’s intentional.  If you’ve watched an Army game, chances are the announcers have talked about the “analytics”.  Army paid a firm a bunch of money to analyze their game performances and churn out a book of answers for situations the team may see during games, so they could optimize their choices in clutch situations.  These are things Army needs to do to win.  Because of this, Army football is more of a science than an art, and AFF’s Keys to Victory are just steps in the equation.

 

 

1. Hold onto the ball… please?

Seriously, Army has had a turnover in every game this season.  We have turned the ball over in critical situations in all three games.  That’s not okay.  Besides the fact that turnovers are bad football, they also limit the offenses’ ability to sustain drives while placing the rest of the team in less than comfortable situations.  Plus, it forces our defense to bail the offense out, and as we get deeper into our schedule, we may find that this is not good enough to get wins.

Winning is fun! ?#GoArmy pic.twitter.com/ZIY9JMK0if

— Army Football (@ArmyWP_Football) September 15, 2019

 

2. Rush for 400 yards.

This may seem aggressive, but hear me out.  To date, Army is averaging 257 yards/game rushing which is good for 18th in the nation.  Typically Army is in the top 5, and we at As For Football would love to see the Black Knights get back to the top.  Morgan State allowed 620 yards of total offense against Bowling Green, 326 of them rushing.  This Army team is a much more talented team than Bowling Green and should have no problem blowing the Bears’ doors off with our rushing attack.

A 400+ yard rushing game is just the thing our offense needs to get back on track.

Dreams turned into reality for Jabari Laws in his first career start.#GoArmy pic.twitter.com/C2AzgC60sz

— Army Football (@ArmyWP_Football) September 16, 2019

 

3. Remember Rice.

By all accounts, Rice should have been a blowout win to start the season.  Every metric and every analyst predicted that Army would win without breaking a sweat.

Alas, that’s not how it turned out.  In fact, most Army fans needed to reach for our blood pressure medication about halfway through the game.  Rice turned out to be a much better team than anyone expected and almost caught us sleeping.

Morgan State isn’t as good a football team as Rice is, but this is football, and anything can happen.  Do I think Morgan State will get the upset?  Absolutely not.  But the boys need to come out of that tunnel on Saturday playing their style of football.  Hang onto the ball.  Get 3-5 yards per carry.  Win the battle in the trenches.  Dominate time of possession.

If we do those things, our things, we should have no problem this weekend.

 

That’s all folks.  Remember to tune into the game.  It’s at 12pm Eastern on CBS Sports.

Beat Morgan State!