Vern Evans
The Navy Midshipmen football team brought home its first winning season since 2019, earning a spot in the Lockheed Martin Armed Forces Bowl on Dec. 27 against the Oklahoma.
But before Navy (8-3) takes on the Sooners, the Midshipmen must first set their sights on a rival Army team making its own bit of history. The U.S. Military Academy at West Point cadets won the service academy’s first conference championship in program history on Saturday with a 35-14 victory over Tulane University.
The Black Knights head into this weekend’s matchup with Navy owning a record of 11-1, their only loss coming to the then-No. 5 ranked Notre Dame by a score of 49-14.
The Midshipmen didn’t escape Notre Dame either, dropping their game to the Fighting Irish 51-14. Navy’s other two losses came at the hands of Rice University and Tulane.
Army joined the American Athletic Conference this season after playing independently since 2004. Navy joined the conference in 2015 and has since posted three winning seasons, two of which saw the middies finish 11-2.
Heading into this game, the Black Knights were ranked No. 19 in the Associated Press college football poll. This season also netted Army its fifth top-25 finish in the College Football Playoff rankings.
For a brief period this year both Army and Navy were ranked in the top 25 for the first time since 1960. At the time, Army was ranked in the AP poll at No. 23 and Navy No. 25.
Contributing to Navy’s success was the return of quarterback Blake Horvath from a thumb injury that sidelined him for the bulk of last season. Under new offensive coordinator Drew Cronic, Horvath caught fire, earning Comeback Player of the Year Award nominations along the way. Cronic’s scheme has been praised by the likes of former Alabama head Coach Nick Saban.
The Midshipmen went undefeated for their first six games, beating a nationally ranked Memphis team on Sept. 21.
And while Midshipmen currently sit third in the AAC, Navy’s turnaround year would no doubt be complete with the most significant feather in their cap this season so far: defeating the Black Knights for the first time since 2021.
This year’s clash, which marks the 125th occasion between the two academies, is slated for a 3 p.m. ET kickoff at Northwest Stadium in Landover, Maryland. The game will be broadcast on CBS.
Riley Ceder is a reporter at Military Times, where he covers breaking news, criminal justice, investigations, and cyber. He previously worked as an investigative practicum student at The Washington Post, where he contributed to the Abused by the Badge investigation.
Todd South has written about crime, courts, government and the military for multiple publications since 2004 and was named a 2014 Pulitzer finalist for a co-written project on witness intimidation. Todd is a Marine veteran of the Iraq War.
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