Armed Forces Bowl Reads

Just like the east coast snow did to New York, the Army/SMU bowl news rolled in and I am just now digging myself out.


From the top: Coach Ellerson's ties to June Jones are hashed and rehashed.

Here's a pretty good story from an alternative source.


I can't remember if I posted the game notes, so here they are again. (pdf)


This one brings ten keys to the game for the Black Knights.

In as many words it says to play football and beat the other team.


This one is a profile piece on Steve Erzinger. A nice final write up of one of the team's stars.




Sal has his Armed Forces Bowl notebook.

Spirits are up around the team, but Sal has spent some time hinting that the team hasn't exactly utilized their allotment of 15 practices. To me those are valuable practices where a team can work some of the younger players into the mix. After the Kent State game the bowl game was immaterial - the team earned the right to practice 15 extra times and the idea is that would hopefully catapult the team to a quick start in 2011.

Not utilizing those practices doesn't make 2010's 6 wins meaningless, but the heat is clearly on to win the next one and make it to 7 wins.

 Competing with Navy and Air Force is for another day. The Black Knights' goal today is winning a bowl for the first time since the 1985 Peach Bowl.

"We didn't have any institutional memory in terms of how to handle our bowl preparation," Ellerson said. "I think we've given ourselves a chance to play well."

Play well in the next game, yes. Using the time to set the team up for 2011? The jury is still out on that.

As it is today Army plays for both this season and next year all at once.
The turkey is on the table: Army @ SMU.