How an Army Victory Over Notre Dame Could Upset the CFP This Year and Years to Come (Video)

History hangs heavily on this weekend’s massive showdown between Army and Notre Dame. Once upon a time there was the country’s most famous rivalry, a war that enchanted the entire country. Americans eagerly awaited the newspapers, gathered around radios and stared into the glow of giant early televisions to find out which of these titans would win the best and most important game of the year.

Army-Notre Dame inspired both the greatest speech in the history of sports journalism—“The Four Horsemen Rode Again Against a Blue-Gray October Sky” by Grantland Rice—and the greatest pregame speech in sports history, Knute Rockne’s “Win ​​one for the Gipper “-Plea. It is the source of sports as myth, coaches as stern but loving father figures and players as doomed or sublime heroes.

So it’s kind of perfect, narratively speaking, that this rivalry, so far down from its 20th-century peaks, could once again change the trajectory of an entire sport. Rockne, Red Blaik, Ara Parseghian and other legends of the Notre Dame-Army rivalry wouldn’t recognize the business of college football today, but the main focus is assessing the man on the other side of the line, beating him and letting cards fall where they may – would be warmly familiar.

Army and Notre Dame won 16 national championships in the 20th century, including seven in the 1940s alone (technically six, since they shared the same title in 1946). They have fallen sharply since then; Army’s last title season was in 1946 and Notre Dame’s was in 1988. Since then, the Irish have fought their way back to prominence with limitless resources, a de facto personal broadcast network and a national recruiting presence.

The far more interesting change is taking place at West Point, where the Army is in the process of making history on multiple fronts. The 9-0 Black Knights are one win away from their fourth double-digit win in the program’s entire 131-year history. You have to go back to 1958 to find Army’s last undefeated season. Aside from a seven-year stint in Conference USA at the turn of the millennium, Army was a proud independent until this year when it joined the AAC and took control of the joint.

The wonder is how Army got itself into this position despite not being able to take advantage of college football’s two earth-shattering weapons: NIL and the transfer portal. The Army doesn’t allow its players to take zero money, and you don’t just parachute into West Point for a single mercenary season.

But it’s not hard to see that Army’s old-fashioned ethos is a counterintuitive advantage. While other AAC schools raided for their best talent or tried to assemble a team of one-off bounty hunters, Army is building a team. (Yes, that sounds like a commercial. But that doesn’t make it any less true.)

Quarterback Bryson Daily, for example, played exactly one game as a freshman and didn’t throw a pass. As a sophomore, he played five times and scored two touchdowns on 12 rushing attempts. He took over the starting job as a junior and now leads all FBS quarterbacks in rushing yards as a senior and ranks second in rushing touchdowns with 21. This is the way to wait your turn and be ready when called. Mindset that the portal and NIL have already wreaked havoc across the country.

As Florida State has shown in shocking fashion, it’s not enough to sign a bunch of high-profile recruits, throw them a ball and expect them to win games. Team cohesion also helps, the kind of cohesion you get when you live, eat, train and bleed together for three or four seasons. NIL can cover up many of college football’s sins, but it can’t replace them.

Army beats its opponents by grinding them into dust, holding the ball for long stretches of the game, and using opportunistic turnovers and a conservative ball-control offense to dictate the tempo. It is a way to defeat a physically superior opponent; Stay in the conversation long enough and you can take control…both in the game and in the season.

Admittedly, the army’s adherence to schedules is a real problem despite its impeccable record. The Black Knights sit 19th in the current CFP standings, behind a number of teams with one, two or three losses. The SEC and Big Ten can argue over which is the better conference; With the AAC there are no such debates.

That’s what makes this weekend’s rematch against Notre Dame so compelling and so crucial. Army now has a chance to turn the entire playoff structure on its head. All it has to do is overcome a projected 14.5-point lead and break a 15-game losing streak dating back to 1958. But if Army can do that, it’s all up for grabs – a new Group of Five team is working its way into the playoff conversation, and the Irish are either out of contention entirely or trying to get ahead of another SEC squad with two justify defeats. And when the playoffs begin, who knows what could happen next? We are in uncharted territory here.

Certainly Army-Notre Dame will never return to its glory days when it determined the fate of the college football universe. But it’s another crucial matchup to keep an eye on, and it’s one of so many elements of this season worth celebrating.