That was madness, folks.  In some ways, it was the best, most exciting football game I’ve seen in ages.  But also, it was a panic-inducing cringe-fest of missed opportunities and near disaster.

Honestly, I’m of two minds about it.  

Good teams find a way to win. #GoArmy pic.twitter.com/D2Sc6PQVMq

— Army Football (@ArmyWP_Football) October 20, 2018

Yeah, good teams win when they don’t necessarily have their best stuff.  That’s doubly true against other good teams. And yeah, Miami (OH) is now just 3-5.  But they’d won three of their last four heading into yesterday’s contest, and that had been good enough to both get their season turned around and to pull them into a first place tie with Buffalo in the MAC-East.  They absolutely had to have yesterday’s game.  I think we all saw that.  On top of which, Army was without both its starting quarterback and its best run-stuffing safety.  Yet the Black Knights still got the victory, and there is no substitute.

That’s good.

But.  Army should’ve won by 14.  I actually thought for awhile that my first post for As For Football was gonna be some shitheeled lament about “What could have been…”  Especially after the offense failed to punch it in at the end of the first half.  What’s irksome about that is that Miami succeeded in exactly the way that they’ve been succeeding all season, which was exactly what I said was gonna happen in the preview if Army didn’t cover the RedHawk running backs catching passes out of the backfield.  Thankfully, we don’t have to get into “What could have been…” too much today, but Army didn’t win yesterday by playing Army Football, and it doesn’t get any easier from here.  A win is a win, but that one didn’t inspire as much confidence as it could have.

So.  I am Dan Head, aka Danno E. Cabeza, and I am the new Senior Writer here at As For Football. We’re still working out exactly what that means, but bottom line, if you’ve been following my Army Football Previews and Quick Thoughts recaps over at Casa Cabeza, they’re now going to be here.  And if you don’t know what I’m talking about…  

No excuse, right?

Actually, one of the biggest reasons I agreed to come over here is that the current As For Football crew is both younger and a lot more new-media savvy than I am personally, and yes, that’s annoying because the Corps has.  But also, our particular readerships don’t much overlap, making this is a good opportunity on both sides.  We’ll see how it goes.

My thoughts on yesterday’s game were as follows:

1.  Miami came into yesterday’s contest with one of the Group of 5’s better run defenses.  Army gashed them pretty good in the first half, running for 202 yards and chewing up 22:59 in time-of-possession.  I know that because they showed it on the scoreboard at halftime. But the RedHawks stuffed FB Darnell Woolfolk on 4th-and-inches to end the half, and it was a harbinger of things to come.  Granted, from where I sat in the stands it looked like Woolfolk got in, but still. The RedHawks gave up maybe another 100 yards of total offense in regulation, and they absolutely dominated second half time-of-possession.

That was not a good deal.

I thought QB Cam Thomas played well for the most part, but like a lot young triple-option quarterbacks, he had a tendency to call his own number, especially early.  Thomas finished with 137 yards on 26 carries (5.3 yards/carry), but he was also stuffed a lot, and in the second half, the RedHawks were really keying on him. Woolfolk finished with 22 carries for 96 yards (4.4 yards/carry) while FB Andy Davidson had 7 carries for 39 yards (5.6 yards/carry). 

Really, Army’s fullbacks were getting good production.  I suspect, however, that Thomas wasn’t super-comfortable reading “give” on the Midline Option, with the result that the Fullback Dive was about 10% less a part of the offense than it had been in the previous games–45% yesterday vs. about 55% on the season.

If Thomas starts again next week, that’ll be the biggest thing he needs to improve.

WOOLFOLK carrying some defenders in with him. @ArmyWP_Football has the lead here in 2OT! pic.twitter.com/Gz9eqZB0ZF

— CBS Sports Network (@CBSSportsNet) October 20, 2018

2.  Speaking of Thomas, I think he’s got a little more speed than Hopkins, and he might be a little more elusive, too.  He’s also got a strong arm, too, given that both of his pass attempts looked like frozen ropes. However, both throws went to receivers who were basically open.  There were plays there, but he needed to lead the receivers more. Similarly, he had a couple of pitches that went behind the slotbacks, one of which was fumbled.

It was pretty clear from the stands that the coaching staff wasn’t super-confident letting Thomas throw.  Had Hopkins played, I suspect he’d have thrown six or eight more passes, and that would’ve made a Hell of a difference.

 3.  SB Kell Walker played really well.  He finished with 11 carries for 51 yards (4.6 yards/carry), and tellingly, when the team needed to make a play in double-overtime, they repeatedly went to him on the Rocket Sweep.  As good as Miami’s defense played against the run inside, they gave up big chunks every time Army got the ball out in space.

 4.  RedHawk QB Gus Ragland also played really well.  He finished 30/53 passing for 329 yards and *4* touchdowns. Maybe more importantly, he didn’t take many sacks.  Army brought pressure a lot, but Ragland kept dumping the ball down to a back out of the backfield, and Army never seemed to have a guy there to stick it behind the line.  

The RedHawks rushed for a grand total of 77 yards on 27 carries (2.9 yards/carry), and mostly that was Ragland running for his life on 3rd or 4th-and-long.  That was good. But Army also let RedHawks running backs catch 8 passes out of the backfield for 95 yards, and it very nearly cost them the game.  I’m gonna say that this is mostly where they missed S James Gibson, who was out with an unspecified upper body injury. Army plays a lot of Big Nickel defense with Gibson as the run-stuffing safety, and those checkdowns would probably have been his responsibility.

The @ArmyWP_Football defense came to play today. pic.twitter.com/6QYNm7nf1G

— CBS Sports Network (@CBSSportsNet) October 20, 2018

So yeah.  Every time Ragland got in trouble in the pocket, he dumped the ball down to the flat.  It was always open, and he almost always hit it. Twice I thought he maybe should’ve been called for intentional grounding.  Mostly, though, those quick checkdowns killed the Black Knight defense.

The one time Army’s defense got home came in double-OT.  CB Elijah Riley came on a Corner Blitz and hit Ragland before he had time to react.  Great play, but that was pretty much it.

5.  The good news is that Army’s defense didn’t melt despite being on the field for 38:52.  They forced Miami into 3rd- or 4th-and-long repeatedly, and they held the RedHawks to just 5/18 on 3rd down.  Good! But they also let the RedHawks go 7/9 on 4th down, nearly all of which came on long desperation plays. That’s less good.

I kept thinking, “Army’s just one play from taking control of this game.”  But they didn’t make that decisive play until double-overtime.

WHAT A FINISH! Miami goes for the win and @ArmyWP_Football comes up with a HUGE stop. pic.twitter.com/G0glJfphq6

— CBS Sports (@CBSSports) October 20, 2018

6.  Army has finally found a placekicker in K John Abercrombie.  Hallelujah!

BIG TIME!

John Abercrombie comes through for @ArmyWP_Football and we are headed for 2OT. pic.twitter.com/ka27gK14nc

— CBS Sports Network (@CBSSportsNet) October 20, 2018

7.  Finally, the game itself was great, and the security procedures at the stadium weren’t too overwhelming considering the size of the crowd.  Michie was quite full yesterday. However, traffic was God-awful getting onto and especially off of post after the game. Easily the worst experience I’ve ever had trying to leave.  Easily.

I got to tailgate with some of my classmates up by Lusk Reservoir after the game, and that was awesome, especially the Bloody Mary’s, but getting out afterwards took a full hour-and-a-half.  Ugh.

Class of 95 in the house after a GREAT win. #GoArmy

What a game! pic.twitter.com/eXFeOmxBUn

— USMA Class of 1995 (@USMA_1995) October 20, 2018

 

Next up: Eastern Michigan in their building.  The Eagles are 4-4, 2-3 in the MAC-West, and like the RedHawks, they need a win.  Good news is that their rushing defense doesn’t look nearly as good as Miami’s has been.  Bad news is that like the RedHawks, they also have a talented senior quarterback leading a potent passing attack.

Go Army!  Beat Eastern Michigan!!!