Point Blank – September 24
Why has Army been so terrible on the road (ruminations of a book I will likely never find the time to write)…The Giants should have Jon Beason back in the middle tonight…Rembrances of Pointspreads Past, for a clue to Ball State/Northwestern…
Once upon a time betting Army as a road underdog brought some unique value over the market expectations. Lines based mostly on power ratings and base home field advantages would not account for a higher level of discipline and maturity for players from the Academy, and they would go out and compete well, often negating talent disadvantages with their precision. And had you not tracked college football recently, you might accept that logic as still being valid, and perhaps consider the Black Knights this week at Eastern Michigan.
Before taking the plunge you might decide to actually look up the recent pattern, and when you do it becomes a shock – over the last 4+ seasons it has been 21 consecutive losses away from the banks of the Hudson River, and a shocking 2-19 ATS tally. The market projections have not even been close, Army under-performing by a collective 259 points vs. the expectations, an error of 12.3 per game.
What has gone wrong? Some of it is continuity. In my early days of betting on Saturday’s there was a stretch from 1983-1999 when Jim Young and Bob Sutton were the only two head coaches, and there were eight winning seasons across that span. Now they are already on their fifth coach in this millennium, and there has only been one winning campaign since 1996.
The wheels came off badly through what was a bad hire in 2000, Todd Berry bringing in a spread passing attack that was quite a transition from decades of option football, and also a bad fit for the kind of athletes that come to the Academy – the grit, mental toughness and precision to make an option ground attack go was available, but not the kind of speed at WR to succeed through the air. The four seasons begun by Berry brought a horrific 5-42, with John Mumford finishing in 2003. They then tried to settle things down by bringing in veteran Bobby Ross, but he only managed a 9-25. Stan Brock went 3-9 in each of his two seasons. It was 20-41 under Rich Ellerson, and so far 4-10 under Jeff Monken. Option football has returned, winning hasn’t, and the markets are struggling to adjust down to the proper level, especially when the team hits the road.
What has gone wrong? Here is a notion I have been intrigued by, and would relish the opportunity to research and explore if the time was ever available – while there was a slide near the end of the Sutton era, and the Berry years were just awful for some genuine practical reasons, might there also be something else at play. Did 9/11, and the actions to follow, change the recruiting patterns?
That event began a cycle that led to something that those thinking about attending the Academy had not really had to deal with since the end of the Vietnam conflict, the fact that they could have their boots on the ground in a combat zone. This is absolutely not meant to be an indictment of the spirit of the kind of young men that want to serve their country via the military, but rather that of the three institutional options – Army, Air Force, Navy – going to West Point brought a much greater chance of being in the line of fire.
From the first season following 9/11 until today, Army has gone 40-118. Yet in that same span it has been 104-79 for Navy and 89-76 for Air Force. That is a large discrepancy between programs that should not be that far apart in theory. Has it genuinely been a case of some of the best and brightest of their generation preferring options that enabled them to serve, but also lessened their chance of being a target? It would be a fascinating study to undertake. For now it does mean that the old models for charting Army football have been altered from my end, and note that while one of those two covers over the past five seasons did come at Connecticut two weeks ago, it took a rather fluky 71-yard TD pass with 5:03 remaining to get through the back door in that one.
Army football has changed, far more than the way the markets have been able to adjust for it. It has been bittersweet, because betting on the Black Knights in those road underdog roles in the past brought some of the most enjoyable roots of my betting life. Times have changed, and the shrewd handicapper needs to change with them.
Item: Jon Beason is upgraded to Probable
In Tuesday’s NFL recap there was a take on the struggles of the Giants defense, with injuries not only limiting how creative Steve Spagnuolo could get, but also making depth a major issue, and possibly one that could be linked to those game-ending drives by the Cowboys and Falcons that found paydirt. So following Beason’s status was put on alert, and it looks like he will be on the field tonight, although there has not been an announcement made as to whether or not he will start. It does mean that Uani ‘Unga, who has had to play every down at MLB, will not have to carry that load, and against the way the Redskins have been executing their running attack, this does matter.
In the Sights, NCAA…
Rembrances of Army football did not provide the only nostalgia this week, in seeing Northwestern go to -20.5 against Ball State yesterday, despite the fact that the Wildcats have only scored 16 and 19 in their first two lined games, brought a fundamental handicapping notion into play, and the memory of one of the most unique settings in pointspread history. Once upon a time, in the final game of the season, a team was favored by more points than they had scored in any previous game. It does not sound like the sort of thing that could happen, but it did.
The year was 1987, the setting was Brown Stadium in Providence, at a time when the Ivy League was still granted full board status. The Bears were home against Columbia, the Lions in the midst of their 44 game losing streak. I remember betting the game, and the fun that long-time colleague “Old Joe”, who has been written about here often but is sadly no longer with us, and I had in breaking it down. Yes, Columbia was having another bad season, but here is what Brown had accomplished prior to that week –
17-7 at Yale
17-15 URI
13-7 Princeton
17-38 at Penn
23-15 Cornell
0-41 at Holy Cross
9-14 Harvard
10-7 at Lehigh
19-0 at Dartmouth
I was having trouble recalling the exact line, so reached out to Bruce Marshall of THE GOLD SHEET, one of the truly good people in this industry, and he was quick to respond with Brown -26. That fit with what I remembered, the Bruins not only being favored by more than they had scored in any game, but indeed by nearly double their average of 13.8 through nine contests. Could a team that had played a season of truly dismal offense possibly be considered 50-50 to cover a 26-point tariff? Our pockets said no. The result? A rocking chair cover, Columbia competing well to win the game outright before falling 19-16. In truth it was a terrible line, because no matter how badly the Lions had been faring, Brown just did not have the punch to get that kind of margin.
Neither does Northwestern, and this week that puts #307 Ball State into play. First, note that I chart the 37-0 Wildcat win over Eastern Illinois off to the side, with games like that of precious little statistical value. Instead the focus is on the grinders of 16-6 over Stanford and 19-10 vs. Duke, and the fact that there was not a single long TD drive in either game. An offense that lacks playmakers only found the end zone twice, on runs of 42 and 55 yards (there was also a KO return for a TD at Duke), and the former was actually more of a broken play than design, QB Clayton Thorson not being much of a run threat. Even the latter did not come from starter Justin Jackson, who is only averaging 3.9 per carry, but instead back-up Warren Long.
In those two wins the Wildcats only managed 32 first downs and 613 yards, an anemic 3.9 per snap even with the two long TD runs included (it is an unholy 3.4 without them). Thorson was only 21-47 through the air, with zero TDs and a pair of interceptions. It is an offense that is going to have to grind hard to make things happen, and teams that lack punch are not supposed to be laying nearly three full touchdowns. What also helps here is that the underdog will bring something.
Stepping up to challenge a Big 10 opponent means something for Ball State, covering both times in the role under Pete Lembo, including taking Iowa to the final possession before falling 17-13 as +19 last year. This trip is being treated as special by the school, with the team traveling on Thursday, a day ahead of the usual schedule, and the players being plugged into some alumni functions in the area on Friday. And there is also the fact that true freshman QB Riley Neal has a chance to be special. This will be Neal’s first start, but he made his presence felt with a sparkling showing in last week’s win at Eastern Michigan, turning in a 24-28-194 through the air, while also running for 86 yards and a TD. At 6-5/217 Neal has a lot of tools, and note that he had the talent to play at a higher level, but both his father and uncle played at Ball State, so this was his natural choice.
Neal’s transition is made easier by the cast of veterans around him – there are four fifth-year seniors starting in the OL, with another backing up a junior at the fifth position, plus seniors Jordan Williams and KeVonn Mabon starting at WR, and fifth-year Dylan Curry at TE. They can help to settle Neal into this flow, and it sets up a game that can be much more competitive than the market projections, especially with Pat Fitzgerald more than happy to win by 13, and keep his team fresh for the Big 10 grind ahead (the Northwestern bye week does not come until November).
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