“I want to pay respect to coach Monken and Army, ” said Navy coach Ken Niumatalolo, who is expected to announce soon that he is taking the BYU head coaching position.
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The Black Knights have lost 13 straight rivalry games to the Midshipmen, while neither team had lost more than five straight games prior to Army’s current streak.
Reynolds rushed for two touchdowns and threw for one to lead the No. 21 Midshipmen to their 14th straight win over the Black Knights, 21-17 on Saturday at Lincoln Financial Field in Philadelphia. As the victors, they get to hold onto the Commander-In-Chief’s Trophy for yet another year. The Army-Navy game will be played at M&T Bank Stadium in Baltimore, Maryland in 2016 before turning back to Philadelphia in 2017. Three of those Army fourth quarter drives ended in turnovers while another culminated in a missed 29-yard field goal. In his previous eight Army-Navy games, Navy is undefeated.
Reynolds can become the first quarterback to win this rivalry four consecutive seasons, and he will look to put pressure on Army’s defense by keeping them confused with the triple option.
Navy’s winning streak against Army is the second-longest of any uninterrupted FBS series, according to STATS. Their campaign will continue with an opportunity to win 11 games in a season for the first time in program history against Pitt. This year Reynolds stands on the threshold of tying Georgia Southern’s Adrian Peterson and Towson’s Terrance West for the Division I touchdown title at 84.
In their 116th meeting, Navy and Army traded leads several times, but Navy quarterback Keenan Reynolds kept the ship steady racking up 249 total yards with two rushing touchdowns and one passing touchdown.
With their head coach seemingly on his way out the door, the Mids overcame some rare first-half mistakes (two bad snaps and a couple uncharacteristic penalties) and managed to shut out the Black Knights in the second half for their 10th victory of the season. “I thought they played a heck of a football game”.
On the ensuing Navy drive, Jamir Tillman made a nice grab on a 35 yard completion, but the drive stalled at the Army 38 and Alex Barta pinned the Black Knights inside their 10.
“I can tell you this, ” Army coach Jeff Monken said.
As far as the ways in which Niumatalolo inspires his players, the Navy coach said at halftime, with his team trailing 17-14, that the “seniors took over”.
Army and Navy turned a game already stuffed with pomp and patriotism into a bit of a fashion show.
Navy leads the all-time series with Army, 60-49-7, including 14 victories in a row.
Reynolds scored on runs of 58 yards and 1 yard to keep Navy in the game, and then used his arm to find Tillman in the third for the lead.
The Midshipmen will now turn their attention to Pittsburgh (8-4) as Navy gets set to battle the Panthers in Annapolis in the Military Bowl on December 28th.
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The 2012 season marked the beginning of Reynolds’ sensational, record-setting college career.
