In the dust-up over whether the Army-Navy Game should be moved to accommodate the College Football Playoff’s timetable for announcing access bowl bids, it appears that there might be some progress being made toward a common-sense solution:
Under discussion: If Navy is that highest-ranked team going into the Army game, a loss would drop it to the bowl inhabited by the No. 2 Group of Five team. The CFP Selection Committee would make that determination with its rankings.
“I know that there is a discussion about it,” Navy athletic director Chet Gladchuk told CBSSports.com. “Call it a popular consideration.”
This is the same suggestion I made back in January, not that it was some stroke of genius on my part. It just seemed like a pretty simple accommodation.
Simplicity isn’t everyone’s goal here, though. The Mountain West has an interest in knocking the Army-Navy game down a peg, so commissioner Craig Thompson had to find someone in the media to get his message across. That message?
The simple fact is the stubbornness exhibited by those parties is bad for college football.
Bad for college football. The Army-Navy Game being played on the second Saturday of December is bad for college football.
That sounds like some weapons-grade hyperbole. There has to be some hard-hitting reasoning behind such a bold statement, right? Well…
“Let’s say everything is delayed a week,” Thompson said. “That gives a Mountain West team seven days, from Saturday to Saturday, to go to the Las Vegas Bowl. It’s hard enough now on Dec. 5 having barely a couple of full weeks to get ready for it. One week would be, c’mon.”
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“I’m a full American,” Thompson said. “I’m all in favor of the Army-Navy game. I think it’s a tremendous athletic event, but it’s disruptive to 128-plus other FBS schools.”
That’s the only reason that was given. This is apparently what’s “bad for college football.”
It’s an utterly ridiculous claim. Playing Army-Navy after the CFP makes its selections isn’t “disruptive to 128-plus other FBS schools.” It might be disruptive to one: the second-ranked Group of Five champion, if that champion is from the Mountain West, and if that champion is close enough to Navy in the eyes of the CFP committee for the Army-Navy results to even matter. Nobody else would have reason to care.
If Thompson is concerned that his champion won’t have enough time to prepare for the Las Vegas Bowl, then it makes more sense to move that game. Between the Las Vegas Bowl and Army-Navy, which one has been played longer? Which one has the better attendance? Which one has more people coming in from out of town? Which one has the bigger television audience? Which one is the more valuable media property? Why move a fixture of college football’s regular season for the sake of a bowl game, when bowl game dates change every year? The value of the Las Vegas Bowl wouldn’t be any different if it was played on a later date, and it could have just as much time to promote itself as it does now.
(It should also be noted that Navy won the Poinsettia Bowl only 10 days after playing Army last year.)
It would be easier to move the Las Vegas Bowl if Thompson’s concern was truly rooted in preparation time for his champion, but it isn’t. Thompson sees this situation as an opportunity to weaken a rival conference, and to remove a thorn that has been in Air Force’s side since the school was created. To argue that this is out of some greater concern for college football would be humorous if it wasn’t so conniving.
You know what’s really bad for college football? That a system exists whereby the schools that have every financial and competitive advantage can quite literally write their own rules– rules that codify these advantages to ensure that they will be maintained forever. Among the schools left on the outside looking in, there is but one property with a financial heft comparable to those owned by the powerful. And who is looking to take that property away? Not the “Power 5” conferences. They couldn’t care less. No, this is a challenge from another “have not” with an “if we can’t have it, no one can” attitude. Thompson’s Mountain West spent most of its existence criticizing the BCS monopoly, but now it wants everyone to fall in line for the good of college football? Nothing disingenuous there!
The Army-Navy Game has been the cherry on top of college football’s regular season for as long as anyone can remember. Based on the game’s ratings, that’s exactly where people want it to be. That there is some hypothetical scenario that might inconvenience the Mountain West is not reason enough to move the game. Some might choose to label Army and Navy as “stubborn.” Maybe it’s true. But in a world where so much of the fun and tradition of college football is being killed off for the sake of the Power 5’s bottom line, thank goodness someone is willing to be.
The Birddog 
Well said!
i liked your first title better!
Clearly there is an agenda being driven here. And that agenda is not in the best interest of the 128 Teams in Div 1A college football. It’s solely in the interest of certain people in the MTN West Conf. They can all go pound sand.
Army-Navy was played over the Thanksgiving Day weekend for a long time, but it was moved to accommodate TV and the other schools as conferences grew and scheduled games increased and there were more ‘big’ games over the Thanksgiving weekend. It moved to the weekend after Thanksgiving when the only other big game was the SEC championship game, which usually came on TV after the Army-Navy game. Then the conferences grew again and other conferences started having conference championships so Army-Navy moved AGAIN to accommodate TV and the other schools. Army-Navy has been accommodating for years and sometimes you have to stand-up and say no more, we matter too. I heard AD Gladchuck offer up the chance to play in a Big 6 bowl game to keep Army-Navy where it is. Navy may already sacrifice some scheduling If Navy is good enough to play in the new AAC championship, then it loses its open week to prepare for Army. But we are Navy and if we are not prepared by November, then we aren’t Navy. I understand the glamour and appeal of Navy joining a conference but not at the sacrifice of our traditions. Because Navy has long standing traditional games with non-AAC teams (Air Force, Notre Dame, and Army) added to the new AAC conference schedule, Navy can schedule only one “other” game each year. [just my feelings] …… Observation – although they may not have been at the top of their conferences when they played Navy, Navy has played, and defeated, several Power 5 schools over the past 10 years, so we are not irrelevant.
The game was moved because they expanded the season for more games (all Division 1). Then it was moved again to make it the last normal season game like it used to be.
The Las Vegas bowl is the “best game” the Mountain West champion can go to. Really? I would think that a conference that boasts “we are the next best thing to the Power 5” would be able to get its champion into some bigger and better bowl games. This is a horrible tie-in for a conference champion! As a Navy season ticket holder and longtime Army-Navy game attendee I agree with our AD – keep the game on the 2nd Saturday in December. If Mr. Thompson is worried that his team will not have enough time to prepare for the Las Vegas game they should start preparing for the game on Dec. 7. The opponent will be a PAC-12 team who will be announced on Dec 6 during the bowl selection show. Start preparing for that opponent and then, if needed, switch your game plan. As Clint Eastwood stated in “Heartbreak Ridge” the Mountain West needs to “Improvise, Adapt and Overcome!”