The weather does not look good for two option teams that run the ball 77% of the time it should be no problem with 17mph winds and light rain. Air Force already beat Navy, and a win here gets them the Commander-In-Chief trophy back. Army snapped their 5 game losing streak to Air Force last year with a dominating victory 21-0 on the road as they were +300 yards rushing. This is a different Air Force defense this year who has been much better against the run, and have already been tested by Navy. Against Navy they only allowed 129 yards rushing and 3.15 yards per carry. That was the same Navy team that rushed for over 400 yards against them last year. Air Force was +3 rushing TD's in that victory, and +128 rushing yards which should give them confidence going into this game.

On paper it appears that Army has a much better rushing unit ranking 43rd in ypc vs. 69th, but Air Force has faced tougher defenses who rank 59th vs. the run compared to Army's opponents who rank 72nd. Also, Air Force has played a lot of opponents that are used to their style of play considering they play in a conference. Army is independent and thus play many opponents that are seeing the option for either the first time or not in consecutive years. In fact 5 of their 8 opponents they have not faced Army in the last few years. Duke, a team used to seeing the option was able to handle Army pretty easily. We know Air Force see's it twice a year, and we already have data on them being a much improved unit on that side of the ball in their game against Navy. I love what Jeff Monken is doing here at Army, and I have backed them many times, but this just seems like the type of game that is going to come down to the wire and a field goal.