Singing Second

Army-Navy. Yep, it’s this week – the renewal of the rivalry that started in 1890. This year, Army is 11-1 and Navy is 8-3, but records rarely seem to matter. I know I never take the game for granted and always feel a churn in my stomach in the days and hours leading up to game time. 

The first Army-Navy football game was played November 29th, 1890 on “The Plain” at West Point. Navy had been playing organized football since 1879 and defeated the newly established Army team, 24-0. The 271 members of the Corps of Cadets each contributed 52 cents to pay half of the Navy’s traveling costs for the 1890 game.  Since then, Army and Navy have played 124 times. Navy currently leads the series 62-55, with 7 ties.

 As a cadet, we learned of the importance of the game from day one of Beast Barracks our Plebe Summer. The phrase “Beat Navy!” was ingrained in us. As Plebes, our four official answers for any question were – “Yes sir, No sir, No excuse sir, and Sir I do not understand”, but they might as well have added “Beat Navy!” as a fifth acceptable answer. As a part of our Plebe knowledge, every single day we were required to know exactly how many days there were until the Army-Navy game and had to recite that knowledge as a part of The Days. As an example – “Sir, there are 4 and a butt days until Army beats the hell out of Navy at Northwest Stadium in Landover, Maryland!” . ( A “butt” means something less than a full day.) When Army beats Navy, Plebes have a more relaxed time from the day after the game until the holiday break (of course the intensity of Plebe year picked back up after the holidays were over.) 

I should also point out that it’s not just the Army-Navy game in football. It’s the biggest game for every sport at West Point, whether wrestling, baseball, gymnastics, women’s soccer or whatever. The Navy Game is THE highlight of that sport’s schedule. 

When I was at the Academy, we lost to Navy in football every single year … until my Firstie (Senior) year. We won the 1977 game 17-14. It was freezing in Philadelphia and there were 81,000 people in the stands. I still remember the last few minutes of the game – Army leading, with Navy driving towards the end zone. They reached the Army 9 yard line before turning the ball over on downs.* The joy, the relief, the pandemonium. I remember all of it. As a side note, Cathy (my then fiancé, now wife) came up from DC for the game. One of her memories was riding the Army Mule at some point during the game ;-). I remember her sneaking into the cadet area of the stadium during the second half and we watched the end of the game together. 

More recently, Navy had its infamous (to us) streak of 14 straight wins from 2002-2015. When Army finally won in 2016, I felt more relief than actual joy. Starting with 2016, Army has won 6 of the last 8 meetings including 20-17 in double overtime in 2022, and 17-11 last year with Army’s famous goal line stand at the one foot line with three seconds left on the clock.

Last Friday, Army beat Tulane 35-14 to win the American Athletic Conference Championship game. They went undefeated in league play in their first year of being in that conference. At the post-game news conference, Army’s Coach Monken kept the focus where it needs to be: “Now we’ve got the biggest game of the year coming up in eight days, and we’re looking forward to that.” Army’s outstanding quarterback, Bryson Daily, was more succinct – “Beat Navy!”

If you ever have the chance to attend an Army-Navy Game, I urge you to do so – it’s a day of pageantry – Cadet and Midshipman march-ons, jet flyovers, parachute drops, and of course the game itself. 

There is a long list of great football rivalries. Harvard-Yale, Alabama-Auburn, Florida-Georgia, USC-UCLA and of course Michigan-Ohio State among many others. Here’s the difference – Army and Navy have the passion, the history and the emotion that make any rivalry great, but they also have the unique tie that bind these two schools. Yes, Michigan and Ohio State have a great rivalry, but when the Army-Navy game is over, and the players graduate, they take an oath to the Constitution and will risk their lives together for this great nation.

I’ll tell you another difference. You won’t see the kind of post-game crap you recently saw when Michigan beat Ohio State in Columbus. 

What will you see? At the end of the game, players from both teams gather. The winning team joins the losing team in front of the losing team’s cadets or midshipmen where they sing the alma mater of the losing team. Then, the losing team joins the victors on their side of the field for the singing of the winner’s alma mater with its students. This show of mutual respect and solidarity is something you never see elsewhere. 

It is also why you hear grads from either academy saying, “We sang second this year!” or “Singing second!” when their school wins. 

That’s it for now. I’ll leave you with two last thoughts:

** GO ARMY! BEAT NAVY! **

Addendum:

• * You can view a five minute video of the highlights of the ‘77 game here: https://www.google.com/gasearch?q=army%20navy%20game%201977&source=sh/x/gs/m2/5#fpstate=ive&vld=cid:d3856ea8,vid:C32x4mJzJLo,st:0
• Thanks to classmate John “Smitty” Smith for the photo of the Army defensive stand at the one foot line in 2023.
• Thanks to classmate Mike Creed for digging up the photo from the 1890 game.
• Thanks to classmate Ken Bresnahan for editing support and some adds to the text of this blog.