The Army Black Knights opened their season with a commanding win over Patriot League foe Lehigh last night, and though the team definitely came away with a few things they’ll want to clean up, overall, they made their game plan work almost to perfection. The Black Knights rushed for 375 yards on 6.7 yards/carry, held the ball for six minutes more than their opponents, picked off Lehigh twice, once in the end zone, and thereby held the Mountainhawks scoreless for the final three quarters of play.
At the end of the day, Army won 42-7.
So yeah. Maybe not everything worked perfectly. We could surely nitpick. But we saw a commanding win in college football’s opening week against a team that very much came ready to scrap. That’s not something that every team in college football will get this weekend, even amongst FBS teams hosting FCS opponents.
Army’s defense forced a punt on the opening series, giving up a couple of short passes but doing a nice job bottling up both Lehigh QB Dante Perri and RB Jaden Green in the running game. The Black Knights’ offense then came out in a traditional flexbone set, starting under center. They scored 9 plays and 80 yards later on a drive that featured a glorious fake punt to ILB Andon Thomas, a pass completion to WR Casey Reynolds, and exactly 1 carry from QB Bryson Daily. This drive set the tone for the rest of the game. It also marked the only time all game long in which Lehigh got anywhere near stopping Army’s offense.
Alas, Lehigh scored on the ensuing drive. The Black Knights mostly did an excellent job playing a loose bend-but-don’t break defensive scheme that set up two turnovers in the red zone. That happened by design; that’s how they draw it up. However, we saw a handful of plays this week that the defense would probably like to have back, including a 3rd-and-2 from the Army 18 on this drive in which Lehigh RB Luke Yoder broke free off-tackle for a long touchdown run.
Lehigh’s offensive line got good push against Army’s D-Line all night, but this one running play was the only time in which Army’s second-level defenders allowed a Mountainhawk runner to break free in open space. The Mountainhawks finished with 282 yards of total offense, including 172 yards rushing on 5.2 yards/carry. And yeah, we’d like to see Army give up less than 5 yards/carry on ground. Obviously. Even with that, though, the Black Knights still held Lehigh to 3/9 on 3rd down and 1/3 on 4th down. Army’s defense only forced 2 punts, but they also forced two interceptions, and 2 turnovers on downs.
In the end, the yards-allowed don’t matter, only the points-allowed.
Platt skies for his first PICK of the season!
— Army Football (@ArmyWP_Football) August 31, 2024
📺 @CBSSportsNet pic.twitter.com/6AARiwBoYN
Moreover, Lehigh stayed committed to running the football. They played four different quarterbacks, but only two actually threw passes. In fact, outside of one downfield pass from Lehigh freshman QB Hayden Johnson on 1st and 25 in the 3rd quarter, Lehigh’s passing game remained largely ineffective. As a team, the Mountainhawks finished 10/19 through the air (52.6%) for a mere 110 yards with no touchdowns but two picks. Lehigh’s running game kept this contest competitive on a play-by-play basis, but that wasn’t nearly enough to help them finish drives. Defensively, Army’s back seven played well despite not getting a lot of pressure on any of Lehigh’s quarterbacks in the game’s first three quarters.
Thankfully, we saw a more aggressive defensive approach late in the game. Army finished with 3 tackles-for-loss. Two came from their D-Line. One came from Rush LB Eric Ford.
As noted, Lehigh at no point found anything like an answer for Army’s offense. The Mountainhawks made a concerted effort to stack the box and stop the Fullback Dive, but that let Army’s slotbacks run wild on pitch plays. SB Noah Short finished with 8 carries for 83 yards and a touchdown. SB Samari Howard had just 2 carries, but he took them for a whopping 25 yards. As the game wore on, then, Army’s fullbacks started getting traction against the strength of Lehigh’s defense. FB Kanye Udoh took 15 carries for 75 yards and 2 touchdowns. FB Jake Rendina took 5 for 23 yards and a touchdown. QB Bryson Daily finished with 17 carries for 78 yards and 2 touchdowns, but overall, Army quarterbacks carried on just 32% of the team’s running plays.
This run by Kanye Udoh tonight 💪😤 pic.twitter.com/0shY0iGVjH
— Army Football (@ArmyWP_Football) August 31, 2024
The offense absolutely succeeded in getting the ball out to a lot of different guys across the entire width of the field this week. We haven’t seen that kind of all-over-the-field ball distribution in this offense since 2016, even in games Army dominated. This is an excellent sign.
Final note: Army quarterbacks finished 5/8 passing for 57 yards. Daily missed receivers running free down the field twice, but he hit enough short passing plays to keep Lehigh’s defense basically honest. Backup QB Dewayne Coleman went 2/2 for 22 yards, and man, that dude throws a nice ball.
Looking Forward
Army heads to FAU next week to face a team that looks a lot like Lehigh, at least conceptually. The Owls lost at Michigan State, 16-10, yesterday, and though the FAU passing game looked largely ineffective, their running game could become a problem. In particular, FAU QB Cam Fancher carried 25 times yesterday. FAU’s staff probably didn’t draw it up like that, but Fancher’s running became the focal point of the Owls’ offense down the stretch. Army’s defense will need to find some answers against running quarterbacks — time now — or they’re gonna leave the beach with an “L” next week.
The biggest difference between Lehigh’s execution and FAU’s probably came down to the Owls’ defense. FAU gave up 179 yards rushing on 4.8 yards/carry and over 10 yards/carry to MSU RB Kay’Ron Lynch-Adams, but the Owls still held a determined Spartan rushing attack to just 3/13 on 3rd down and 1/2 on 4th down. We could surely critique Sparty’s quarterback play — QB Aidan Chiles went just 10/24 passing with 2 miserable interceptions — but it wouldn’t change the fact that FAU’s defense came up big late in that game to give their team a chance.
. @DunnamPhillip BRINGS IT BACK 👊 #TriCountyTakeover #WinningInParadise pic.twitter.com/yy4KMdU0pT
— Florida Atlantic Football (@FAUFootball) August 31, 2024
Friends, defense travels. If Army wants to win next week, they’re gonna need to play better on that side of the ball. They’re gonna need to keep Fancher from running all over them, full stop.
It ain’t gonna get easier from here.
Go Army! Beat FAU!!!
Cover image via @ArmyWP_Football.
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