Head Coach: Brian Newberry enters his 2nd season with the Midshipmen following a 5-7 season last year. He’s coached some pretty incredible defenses for both Navy and Kennesaw State and has one of the best beards in college sports. He’s in the challenging position of being the man who follows “the man” but the first year showed some promise.
Program Outlook: Navy is still in a state of transition. The Ken Niumatalolo era ended with a very strange fall off so now it’s up to Newberry to re-establish the winning culture again. Truly the indicator on whether Navy fans are happy with the season is whether they beat Army or not.
How does the 2024 Roster look?: Navy is actually in the top half of The American and the nation in returning production. This is not normal for a service academy, typically there’s a lot of transition because senior heavy atop the depth chart each year. The offense returns a majority of the backs which could help lead to some improvement, but it’s going to come down to finding the right QB to run the offense. Sophomore Blake Horvath currently seems to be the clubhouse leader, he flashed early in the season last year before getting hurt. The defense brings a lot back, the secondary is experienced but their depth is untested in the front seven. Defense led the way most of last year, it didn’t hold up well against Notre Dame, South Florida or SMU but they also managed to record 3 shutouts. Navy was on the receiving end of a lot of turnovers last year, this will be hard to replicate, but that doesn’t worry me as much. Normally for a service academy forcing turnovers is a huge key to victory but for whatever reason last year it didn’t seem to matter for the most part Navy seemed to win easily or was out of the game and lost, the only game you can point to turnovers helping was having a 2-0 turnover margin against North Texas in a 27-24 win.
Screenshot from fbschedules.com1
2024 Schedule Thoughts: There’s not a lot to speak of with the non-conference slate. Navy’s entire slate is always spoken for these days with their annual games against Notre Dame, Air Force and of course Army (still a non-conference game despite Army joining the AAC.) Navy typically fills the last slot with a FCS team that is either from the Patriot League (where Navy houses their other sports) or Delaware. Their AAC draw is pretty tough. Memphis, Tulane and South Florida are arguably the top 3 contenders to win the conference, and Rice brings a lot back. The good news is there’s some programs like Temple and East Carolina that are trying to sort things out. Bucknell, Temple and then the bye really gives Navy a shot to build some momentum early on before they hit the meat of their schedule.
Vegas Projection: Navy’s win total is set at 5.5 with the odds geared toward the under. While Navy could improve, Vegas seems to be indicating we won’t see that improvement on Navy’s final record. This makes sense because generally it felt like there was a gap between Navy and the better teams in the AAC last year while they were able to handle the teams in the lower part of the conference standings.
2024 Best Case: Navy takes advantage of the easy on ramp to gain momentum, they start off 2-0 easily. Navy catches a nice break facing Memphis on an extremely wet day, the Midshipmen never let the Tigers get comfortable in the weather and pull of a conference shaking upset. Navy follows it up by handling UAB and upsetting Air Force to move to 5-0. Navy already clinches bowl eligibility by keeping the sleeves on and handling Charlotte. They suffer their first loss in a tight battle with Notre Dame, but recover by beating Rice before losing two more tight games to South Florida and Tulane. Navy does finish off the year strong beating East Carolina and most importantly taking home the Commander-in-Chief’s Trophy when they take down their rival Army. Navy is rewarded with a Military Bowl bid where they defeat Virginia Tech and finish with 10 wins. Just like that Navy football is back.
2024 Worst Case: Navy gets past Bucknell in the opener but it quickly becomes apparent that something is wrong because the Midshipmen lose to Temple at home. Navy’s offense just never gets it going the rest of the year and they aren’t able to beat any FBS opponents on their way to a 1-11 finish, meanwhile Air Force and Army both win 10+ games, Army takes home the Commander-in-Chief’s Trophy and wins the American, leading to Army getting a bid to the playoff. Army even manages to pull off an upset while they are there, and all Navy can do is watch as everyone celebrates their rivals remarkable achievement.
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