You know you let it creep into your mind, Navy fan. You know that when North Texas scored to take a 21-3 lead, you thought that Navy was just having a “letdown” game after finally beating Notre Dame. You figured that Navy had a hard time getting focused during practice this week, and that coming out flat was a result of that. Fight it back. Don’t let yourself think that. You’ll just be setting yourself up for disappointment the rest of the year.

Records were falling left and right yesterday as Navy outlasted North Texas, 74-62, before 26,000 people at Fouts Field in Denton. Among the records set: the I-A record for most points in a game (136), the Navy school record for rushing yards in a game (572), and the most combined points scored in a half (94) and a quarter (63). Mean Green quarterback Giovanni Vizza’s 8 touchdown passes are a record for the most ever thrown in a single game by a freshman, and the 7 he threw in the first half tied the record for most in a half thrown by anyone.

Coach Johnson was noticeably irritated after the game. This isn’t the first shootout that the Mids have been a part of this year. After those wins, PJ would usually say something like, “It doesn’t matter if we win 6-3 or 46-43 as long as we have more points than they do.” Not this week. Bill Wagner asked Coach what he thought about being a part of such a record-shattering game:

Wagner: So a game like this is historic. Is this the kind of historic game you want to be a part of?
Johnson: Nope. Nope. I don’t want to be a part of it. I’m happy for the kids that they won, and I’m happy that they’re resilient and they came back, but we’ve got to do something. We’ve got to make some changes, do something.

That wasn’t all.

Wagner: How about their freshman quarterback setting like 5 records tonight?
Johnson: Who hasn’t set a record against us?

We’ve heard him talk like that after a loss before, but not really after a win. Usually he’ll point out some mistakes, but follow that up with, “but they found a way to win.” After the North Texas game, Johnson didn’t mention anything along those lines unless he was prompted to. And even then it didn’t last. PJ was pissed.

It’s hard to blame him. Maybe you could dismiss the defense’s performance as a post-Notre Dame hangover if it wasn’t consistent with everything we’ve seen so far this year. Navy gives up 40 points and 469 yards per game. Navy is still last in I-A in pass effeciency defense. Notre Dame came into last week’s game averaging about 30 rushing yards per game, but put up 235 against the Mids. It doesn’t matter how the offense wants to attack; it’s going to work.

I don’t want to rattle off any more about the defense’s futility because you’ve heard it all before. The story here really isn’t that the defense stinks– and whatever momentum they might have had against Notre Dame is toast– it’s PJ’s postgame reaction. He says that changes need to be made, but the nature of those changes are unclear. The defense can’t really be simplified any more than it has been. Todd Dodge was a high school coach last year, and Navy put up a high school defense against him. He did to Navy what he did every week at Southlake Carroll. Fortunately, he was using a high school defense against Paul Johnson, and PJ ripped it to shreds.

It’s really a shame that the defense is so bad, because it overshadows the best Navy offensive performance in generations. The Mids piled up 680 yards of offense. Shun White and Zerbin Singleton both topped 100 rushing yards. Eric Kettani– a fullback, mind you– averaged 12 yards per carry. Adam Ballard had 87 yards and a touchdown in front of friends & family. Kaipo threw for 108 yards and a wide-open touchdown to Tyree Barnes, and he was relieved by Jarod Bryant, who ran for 57 yards and a touchdown of his own in a little less than a half of work. Eight different mids scored a touchdown. Zerb had three. But instead of marveling at the awesomeness of the offense, we’re stuck worrying about the defense. Ten games into the season, we should be used to it by now. But if you’re like me, you aren’t.

I did mention that we won though, right? At 6-4, Navy is now officially Poinsettia Bowl bound. Hopefully the weather is better than what I’m seeing at the Chargers game right at the moment. Charlotte spoiled me last year, since I was able to drive. I forgot how friggin’ expensive airline tickets are around Christmas. Chet said in his pregame show interview that he expects Utah to be the opponent, with an outside shot at BYU or New Mexico. But we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.

Play of the game: Navy actually forced a 3 & out late in the 2nd quarter, trailing 49-38. After the punt, Navy got the ball at midfield with 24 seconds left in the half. The offense lined up in an unbalanced formation, and it left Reggie Campbell with one on one coverage on the short side of the field. Kaipo hit Reggie with a 47-yard pass down the sideline, and Zerbin Singleton punched it in on the next play. That cut the lead to 49-45 and allowed Navy to take the lead after they got the ball to start to the second half.

Birddog Game Ball: Greg Veteto. He got all of one punt in the game, but he made it count. Greg kicked a 51-yarder that was downed at the 2 yard line. Pinned back against their own end zone, the Mean Green were forced to call a couple of conservative plays that left them with a 3rd & 6. Vizza went back to pass, and completed it for what appeared to be a first down (shocking). But there was a flag on the field; holding in the end zone. That’s a safety. Reggie Campbell blasted past everyone and returned the ensuing free kick for a touchdown. That’s 9 points that were made possible by Veteto’s punt.

I think that Buddy
Green, even though I like him,
will need a realtor.

OK, this is getting a bit ridiculous.

Yes, Navy finally beat Notre Dame. But holy cow, you’d think that World War II just ended. Classes cancelled? The Governor declares November “Navy Football Month?” Come on now. I agree that it’s hard to overstate the significance of this win, but the season isn’t over yet. Yes, as fans we can revel in the victory as long as we want, but the team really doesn’t need any more distractions than they are already getting from the media and their fellow mids. I can’t even imagine how hard it is to remain focused after such a landmark victory. It might be hard, but Paul Johnson is doing his part to keep his team facing forward. On Monday he made it known that he wouldn’t be talking about Notre Dame anymore. “Today is the last day we will talk about Notre Dame,” he said at his daily practice press briefing. “This is it. Starting tomorrow we are only talking about North Texas.”

Distraction is the theme of the week as the Mids hit the road once again, this time to Denton, Texas, and the University of North Texas. While the Mids are fighting off the dreaded “letdown” game, UNT is facing some issues of its own. Three Mean Green players have filed a complaint with the NAACP, claiming racial bias from the team’s coaching staff. I have absolutely no insight into the validity of these claims and don’t really want to get into the specifics very much. Regardless of the veracity of the allegations, this has to be driving a wedge into the UNT football team.

For the most part, I think that off-field distractions are overrated. When a player is having legal problems, he’s usually as focused as ever on the field. After worrying about his problems all day, getting into the game is probably the guy’s only way to escape them, if only for a while. This is different, though. UNT’s problems aren’t off the field. Instead, they are at the very core of what makes up a team: trusting your coaches and trusting your teammates. It would be impossible for this not to disrupt practice. But for North Texas, it’s really just one more problem to add to the list.

Once upon a time, North Texas was the Sun Belt Conference. From 2001-2004, Darrell Dickey’s team went 24-1 in conference play, with four Sun Belt titles and the New Orleans Bowl berths that went with them (including a win over Cincinnati in the 2002 game). Dickey’s power running offense made Division I-A rushing leaders out of Patrick Cobbs in 2003 and Jamario Thomas (as a freshman) in 2004. But the wheels fell off the wagon in 2005, and after consecutive 9-loss seasons, Dickey was fired the following year. UNT didn’t have to go very far to find Dickey’s replacement. About 30 minutes south of campus is Southlake, Texas, home of Carroll High school and its coach, Todd Dodge. Dodge was named head coach of North Texas on December 12th.

Hiring a high school coach seems like a risky move, but it isn’t without precedent. It isn’t even the first time that North Texas has done it; in 1991, they hired Dennis Parker from Marshall High School. Notre Dame’s hire of Gerry Faust in 1981 is the most famous example, but it is the success of Art Briles at Houston that really paved the way for North Texas to hire Dodge. Briles came to Houston after a 3-year stint as Texas Tech’s running backs coach. What interested Houston, though, was the 12 years Briles spent prior to that as the head coach of Stephenville High School. Stephenville won 4 state championships under Briles. Over one 6-year stretch, Briles and the high-octane offense he developed posted a 91-11-1 record. He brought that offense with him to Houston, where he has led the Cougars to 3 bowl games in 4 years and the 2006 Conference USA title.

Dodge can boast similar success during his time at Southlake Carroll. Recognized as one of the top high school programs in the country each year by several publications, Carroll won four 5A state titles with Dodge at the helm. Since taking over the team in 2000, Dodge compiled a 98-11 record and ended his stint as the Dragons’ head coach on a 48-game winning streak. Dodge had his own high-flying offense that set the Texas 5A record for most points in a season, scoring 764 in 2005.

(A tangential story– I had a layover in Dallas when I was flying home from the 2004 Emerald Bowl. While my plane was on final approach to DFW, I looked out the window and saw a very nice football field/stadium with “Dragons” written in the end zones. I kept thinking to myself, “what I-AA team with the nickname ‘Dragons’ is near Dallas?” Then it hit me; that wasn’t a college stadium. It was Carroll High School. I think one of the Under Armour commercials was filmed there. They sure take their football seriously in Texas, not that you didn’t already know.)

Todd Dodge has a similar backgroud to Briles, but his results at the college level haven’t kept the pace. North Texas is 1-7 this year, including a 1-4 mark within the Sun Belt Conference. It isn’t all too surprising, considering that he’s attempting to install a wide-open passing game on a team full of players recruited for Dickey’s running game. At least, that’s what you’d think. A closer look reveals that their offense has been able to move the ball. North Texas is ranked 12th in Division I-A in passing offense, averaging close to 300 yards per game. This, despite playing a schedule that includes Oklahoma and Arkansas. In fact, in 4 of the Mean Green’s 7 losses this year, they’ve outgained their opponent. They had 527 yards of offense against Louisiana-Lafayette and a whopping 613 yards against SMU. Wide reciever Casey Fitzgerald had 18 catches for 327 yards in that game. Navy will be challenged to limit the big play this week. Through 8 games, North Texas has 7 more plays of 20 yards or more (41) than they did in all 12 games last year. With an offense this explosive, what could possibly be the problem?

For starters, the Mean Green offense implodes just as often as it explodes. Freshman quarterback Giovanni Vizza assumed the starter’s role in the 5th game. He plays behind a line that starts two freshmen, two sophomores, and only one returning starter from 2006. That combination of a freshman quarterback and young linemen means sacks and turnovers. Whether it’s Vizza or junior Daniel Meager, North Texas quarterbacks have found themselves running for their lives. The North Texas line has given up 31 sacks this year through 8 games. With that much pressure being applied to a freshman quarterback, it’s no surprise that Vizza has thrown 9 INTs in 4 games as a starter. So while North Texas has some pretty impressive numbers in total passing yards, their passing efficiency is ranked 98th in the country. Navy had a season-high 4 sacks against Notre Dame. If that was a sign of progress instead of just a flash in the pan, then the Mids have a good chance of adding to their meager total of 9 takeaways on the year.

As hot & cold as the offense has been, those problems pale in comparison to the struggles that the Mean Green defense has faced this year. North Texas is ranked 116th in total defense, giving up almost 500 yards per game. Of course, playing Oklahoma and Arkansas doesn’t help the numbers. It might help to take a look at another game, though. Louisiana-Lafayette doesn’t run Paul Johnson’s offense, obviously, but it does run a different kind of spread option attack. The Ragin’ Cajuns lead the Sun Belt in rushing offense and are 8th nationally, averaging 241 yards per game. Against North Texas, they averaged 8.3 yards per carry, running the ball 36 times for 300 yards. North Texas dominated time of posession in that game, holding onto the ball for 40:36. UL-Lafayette just didn’t need that much time to score, with 116 of their 300 rushing yards coming on touchdown runs of 43 and 73 yards. Five of the Ragin’ Cajuns’ 6 scoring drives took less than two minutes.

An interesting twist to this game is that Chuck Petersen, a Fisher DeBerry assistant for 17 years, now coaches safeties at North Texas. Petersen was Air Force’s offensive coordinator for seven years. Having run an option offense himself, it will be interesting to see what kind of input he has in how to defend Navy.

Like always, this is a big game for Navy. North Texas is by no means a world-beater, but they play a style of offense that has ripped Navy’s defense to shreds this year. For the defense, it’s a chance to prove that last week’s performance was genuine improvement and not a one-hit wonder.

Learn the name, people. You’re going to be talking about him for a long time to come.

The first overtime game in the 80-year history of Navy-Notre Dame became the first Navy win in the series since 1963, a 46-44 3OT thriller. There will be no more talking about the price of gas back then, no more talking about what the #1 song was, and no more talking about John F. Kennedy. And while I enjoy listening to anything Roger Staubach has to say, he never again will give another interview about being the quarterback of the last Navy team to beat Notre Dame. Because now, he isn’t. That title belongs to Kaipo-Noa Kaheaku-Enhada.

Kaipo was not intimidated by the big-game atmosphere. He thrived on it. When the Notre Dame Stadium crowd got loud, Kaipo would wave his arms to tell them to get louder. When the cameras were on him, Kaipo always had a smile on his face. He had boundless energy. He knew.

And knowing is what you’re taught at the Naval Academy. Paul Johnson talked to the players before and during the game, asking them, “Do you believe you can win?” With all due respect to PJ– and he’s due a whole hell of a lot of it– it isn’t about believing. It’s about knowing. It’s the difference between faith and confidence. You see, believing that you can do anything, while the theme for many a wonderful movie on the Disney Channel, is a bad thing in the military. Having faith in your own abilities means that eventually, you’ll bite off more than you can chew. When you do that, you endanger your own life as well as the lives of those around you. That isn’t what they teach at USNA. Instead, they teach training. Train yourself until you can’t get it wrong. Then, you don’t need faith; you have the confidence of experience. You know what you can do because you’ve done it before. And Kaipo knew. That’s the difference between this Navy team and the 43 that went before it. They all believed they could win. But this team knew. And when you know, all the crowd noise in the world won’t make a bit of difference, except to make the memory that much sweeter.

The way the Naval Academy motivates you to train is through fear. That sounds bad, but it isn’t. The very first thing that you’re taught as you walk through the gates on I-Day is that you, as an individual, no longer matter. You are simply a part of a team, and your own successes and failures are irrelevant next to those of the team. Ship, shipmate, self, as the saying goes. You train not to better yourself, but to better the team. And that’s where the fear comes in; you train because you are scared to death of letting down your teammates.

Enter Ram Vela. The Navy defense, leading Notre Dame 28-21 late in the 4th quarter, had forced the Irish to a 4th & 14 on their own 32 yard line. Ram came in untouched on a blitz. Just when it looked like he was going to get a sack that would have probably sealed a Navy victory, quarterback Evan Sharpley sidestepped the rush and delivered the ball to tight end John Carlson for a 1st down. Ram missed the tackle, and it gave Notre Dame new life. It could have been a catastrophic mistake. But on yet another 4th down play, Ram Vela was sent in on a blitz once again. This time, Vela had a blocker in his path. As the tailback went to block low, Vela would not be denied. The result was the above play, which will live forever as part of Navy football legend. Vela would not let down his teammates. He would not be stopped by any blocker. He would not be stopped by gravity. He would do his job. In the end, it was actually Chris Kuhar-Pitters who would get credit for the sack, which was a tremendous play of his own. But Vela taking flight will be the lasting image of the “not this time” attitude that defined the Navy team in this game.

On that note, I owe Ram and Buddy Green an apology. Last week, I wrote this:

If we’re going to send Ram Vela in on blitzes, then we might as well play defense with 10 people. He’s just too small, and he gets absorbed by the tackle every time. He’s a converted defensive back anyway. Just drop him into coverage. We’d probably be better off with him covering the TE than one of the other linebackers.

As it turns out, Buddy Green knows a little bit more about his players and the game of football than I do. Never in my life have I been so happy to be so wrong. And holy guacamole was I wrong.

Speaking of Buddy Green, he coached the game from the press box on Saturday. Chris Swezey noticed that too, and talked about it in his follow-up:

Saturday marked the first time since he came to Navy in 2002 that defensive coordinator Buddy Green spent the game in the coaches’ box rather than on the field. Johnson said the move was made to help Green see the field better, and that Green likely will be upstairs for the game against North Texas on Saturday.

I really think it made a difference. Navy still gave up a lot of yards to a bad offense, but Notre Dame ballcarriers didn’t have nearly the room to run that Navy’s previous opponents had. Players were in position to make plays, and Buddy Green put them there. Maybe that is the difference between those Navy defenses of years past and 2007. Maybe in previous years, Buddy didn’t have to sit in the booth because senior, experienced players already knew how to line up. We’ve seen the opposite before; a couple of years ago, Ken Niumatalolo was moved from the press box to the field because the offensive line was struggling at the time, and PJ thought they needed more hands-on leadership. Perhaps Buddy can better direct his young defense by seeing the bigger picture.

Team defense was improved, but Navy also put together a series of individual efforts that surpassed anything we’ve seen this year. With 4 sacks in the game, Navy nearly doubled its season total. Those sacks were set up in part by excellent coverage in the secondary. Seven different mids registered a tackle for a loss. Wyatt Middleton had 14 tackles. Freshman Kevin Edwards had 6 tackles and played tremendously in his first start. Nate Frazier played the way Navy fans knew he could, wrapping up 8 tackles and making the most underrated play of the game– in the second overtime, it was Nate who hit Evan Sharpley on 3rd down, causing a bad throw and holding Notre Dame to a field goal. And of course, the defense bailed out the offense twice; holding the Irish scoreless after a Shun White fumble in Navy territory, and scoring a touchdown of its own to give Navy its first lead of the game in the 4th quarter. This truly was a team victory.

Offensively, I wrote last week about the importance of manageable 3rd downs, and that we’d probably “play in a phone booth” as a result. For the most part, that’s what happened. Notre Dame focused on stopping the fullback. The spread formation is designed to open up running lanes by stretching the defense from sideline to sideline, but the Irish didn’t bother. They kept their linebackers between the tackles the entire game. To counter this, Paul Johnson brought his wide receivers in closer to the formation, and stayed that way for almost the entire game. This opened up outside runs by allowing wide receivers to make crackback blocks on linebackers attempting inside-out pursuit. When Notre Dame was forced to adjust, that’s when the fullback started to gain some yardage.

It wasn’t the most mind-blowing game on the stat sheet, with Navy totaling only 338 yards of offense. The statistics don’t tell the story of how well the offense played, though. They executed the gameplan with very few mistakes. Navy only averaged 3.9 yards per rush, but that was by design. The goal was to set up 3rd & short. Coach Johnson was asked about the importance of manageable 3rd downs in his postgame press conference:

It’s real important, and that’s why I call plays the way I do. There was probably some things that we could’ve had in the passing game. But there’s no use in taking a chance when you know you’re going to get four downs. I’m not real smart in math, but 3 a pop will get you 10 in four tries. That’s kind of the way we play, and the way we have to play where we are.

The most impressive performance of the whole afternoon might be that of the offensive line. This is the first Navy-Notre Dame game I can remember where the Navy o-line wasn’t just effective; they were dominant.

Does it matter that this Notre Dame team is no good compared to the last couple of years? No. Navy had lost to bad Notre Dame teams as well as good ones over the last 44 years. And nobody seems to remember that the team that Navy beat in 1963 only won two games. Does it matter that Charlie Weis made some questionable coaching decisions? No. That’s part of the game sometimes. As time goes on, all people remember is the final score. That, and superhuman sacks.

Extra Point: Charlie Weis and Notre Dame deserve a lot of credit for the grace with which they handled the loss. I was never as caught up in the Weis love-fest as most people when he led the Irish over to join Navy in singing Blue and Gold in 2005. I thought he did it because the cameras were on. It’s easy to be gracious after a win. But Weis showed that he was just as gracious in defeat. Not only did he lead his team to the Navy fans to sing Blue and Gold, but he also went out of his way to shake the hands of several Navy players. Some Irish fans have been blasting Weis for the comments he made to a sideline reporter after the game, but I heard nothing to be offended about as a Navy fan. Weis’ playcalling might be subject to criticism, but the graciousness with which he conducted himself afterwards should not.

Seeing Notre Dame fans line the tunnel to the locker room after the game, giving Navy players high-fives, was pretty cool too. I saw more of a connection between these two schools than I ever saw out of Air Force, a school that Navy is “supposed” to regard as a sibling.

I said that a Navy win would be a media bonanza, and here it is:

Mids end 43 years of losing

Ecstatic Navy finally has something to shout about

Bury the hatchet job: I’m here to praise Navy and classy Charlie

ND Torpedoed

Party Time in T-Court!

Irish sink to new low

Beating ND even stops topping Army

Navy earned its victory over ND

ND Woeful, but Navy’s win still big

Now, nothing really matters

Wow, what a game

I was born in America’s finest city, San Diego. My childhood consisted of summer days at the beach. I remember my first Padres game and my first Chargers game. I graduated from a good high school. I was sworn in on I-Day, and 10 months later I climbed Herndon. I was commissioned on a glorious May morning in 1999. I reported to my first ship. I felt the excitement of pulling into my first foreign port in Palermo, Italy. I’ve returned from two extended deployments. I earned my surface warfare pin. I married the woman of my dreams on a beautiful summer night, on a yacht sailing the Potomac and overlooking Washington’s monuments. I was present for the birth of both of my children. My brother found a miraculous match on the bone marrow donor list that allowed him to beat leukemia. I have been unbelievably blessed, and have experienced far more than my fair share of wonderful things.

But today is the happiest day of my life.