The Army Black Knights are spending the first part of this short break in actual football activity by filling up the team’s schedule for the next few years.
While a 2022 game against Colgate is not exactly news that will get fans excited, it is the sort of filler game that the Black Knights need to allow for more extravagant opponents at other points in the season. Expect this to be an opening weekend contest that the Black Knights win as they lead the overall series against the Raiders 22-5-2.
A much bigger splash comes with the news that Army is set to meet Michigan in 2019. This seems to meet the criteria of the current athletic administration to schedule one or two games a season against a big name opponent on the road. These one and done games are usually contests that Army gets paid to participate in and they are great for competition and recruiting purposes.
One team that has not yet committed to more games with Army is Syracuse. The Orange announced last summer that the two sides had agreed to a four-game series commencing in 2023. This is a traditional home-and-home series against a Power 5 school and, given the locations of the two schools and their proximity to each other, is a game that should be played as often as possible.
That is why there were some rumblings last week that the series would wither be moved up, or simply given two extra dates, after North Texas canceled games against the Black Knights in 2018 and 2019. This was seen to be a possibility as the Orange are currently exploring options to fill a couple of holes in their own schedules in those years.
As of right now, however, this doesn’t look likely, as Syracuse are “engaged with other opponents for 2018 and 2019,” according to Syracuse associate AD Sue Edson.
