Army faces and FCS opponent on Saturday knowing that a win is vital if it hopes to sneak in by the back door and secure a bowl bid this season. With the win over Lafayette not counting due to scholarship numbers (and the game against Navy coming after bowls have been selected) Army must beat Morgan State in a game that does count toward bowl eligibility and hope there are not enough six-win teams to fill the 80 bowl spots.
Season so far
The Morgan State Bears have had a rough season in 2016. The team opened up against one of Army’s regular Patriot league opponents as they lost 24-51 at home to the Crusaders. Things went from bad to worse the following week when the Bears played their only FBS opponent of the year so far and were comprehensively drubbed 62-0 at Marshall, in a game where they were outgained 530-222 in yardage and had four turnovers.
The next two weeks proved to be the two best weeks of the season for Morgan State. The Bears beat Howard University and Delaware State, giving them two conference wins and putting the school 2-2 on the season. Morgan State has not been able to push on from that base though and has since lost five contests in a row to fall to 2-7 on the season. The most painful of these losses occurred just last week in a 22-21 defeat at the hands of Florida A&M.
Injuries and Suspensions
As always it is tricky to find detailed injury information when it comes to games against FCS schools. It does though appear that the Bears will have at least four players missing the game against Army with WR Orlando Johnson (knee), RB Nadir Muhammad (foot), DB Cravon Rogers Jr. (arm), and Dominick Trigg (hand) all expected to be on the sidelines. Of this group, it is Johnson that will be missed the most, especially in the Bears return game where he has the ability to break loose and pick up big yardage on his day.
Challenges
Army needs to quickly right itself after the Notre Dame loss and take it to the Bears early. The biggest challenge here for the Black Knights is going to be forgetting what happened against the Irish and not looking ahead to the Navy game, thus overlooking Morgan State. At this point, it is unclear if Ahmad Bradshaw will be back or if the game will again be in the hands of Chris Carter and Malik McGue. Either of the two Army backups would figure to be able to run the offense well in this game as the Bears defense is not nearly at the level of some of the teams Army has faced over recent weeks. This is a game the Black Knights should win and should win convincingly if Jeff Monken still has his team on an upward trajectory.
