Dylone Brooks took a handoff Saturday night in Ruston, Stephen Nnandozie missed the tackle, and 72 yards later Louisiana Tech had a touchdown; later the Bulldogs ran a lateral to Marcus Calwise Jr., who threw it back downfield to Brooks for a 74-yard trick-play score. Army's defense finished with 503 yards allowed, and Jeff Monken's explanation afterward was not about scheme. "We've just got to play better, assignments and fundamentals... We got to tackle better, we've got to get off blocks better." Army lost 31-29. Louisiana Tech piled up 11 plays of 10-plus yards, and Cale Hellums said the two units "weren't complementing each other," while Monken said Army "busted a couple assignments" and "turned guys loose."
A week earlier the same defense had been the reason Army won. Trailing Temple late, Army drove with running back Carson Smith touching it six times, and then cornerback Jaydan Mayes broke up a fourth-and-3 pass intended for Jayce Freeman to end it, 21-17. Monken's read on that night was modest too, "We were very fortunate to find a way to win tonight. Our guys earned it on the last two drives." Four games in, that is the pattern. Bryant and Temple were good, South Florida and Louisiana Tech bad, nothing in between.
This is what the rebuild was always going to look like for a while. Army lost eight primary defensive starters from 2025 and returns Jack Bousum, Kody Harris-Miller and Jaydan Mayes as its anchors, and the unit is being run by new leadership. Daryl Dixon was promoted to defensive coordinator, with Scot Sloan as co-defensive coordinator, while Cody Worley stayed put for a third year running the offense. The one name you'd expect to settle things hasn't. Bousum tied for Army's 2025 lead with 8.0 tackles for loss and 4.5 sacks, but Cael Newton made his first career start in place of Bousum back in Week 2 against South Florida, and no reporting has explained why.
Tulane at Army, Saturday, noon ET, CBSSN
Tulane is the team that wrote this script. At Yulman Stadium last October, Army led 17-10 and held the ball for 38:58 to Tulane's 21:02, and Jake Retzlaff still threw two touchdown passes in the final two minutes, the second a 26-yard juggling catch by Shazz Preston with 27 seconds left. Then South Florida beat Army 28-24 in Week 2 by going 75 yards in 1:47 and 81 yards in 1:27 on its last two possessions, with Army recording no sack and allowing 369 yards, 156 of them on those two drives, and Monken saying his man defender got beaten on an all-out blitz on the decisive fourth down. If you have felt like you've watched this ending before, you have, and Tulane, the same team that wrote it last October, is the visitor again.
The matchup itself tilts Army's way. Entering the week Army ranks first in FBS rushing offense at 334.3 yards per game while Tulane sits 126th against the run at 191 yards allowed, 136th in time of possession and 133rd in red-zone defense, having allowed a score on every opponent trip inside the 20. That is Army's identity against a defense built to lose to it. The same identity that led the NCAA in 2025 with 10 drives of at least 15 plays and five possessions over nine minutes. Those drives stall when the passing game doesn't hold up. Hellums went 12 of 24 for 151 yards with a touchdown and an interception at Louisiana Tech, a week after a near-perfect night throwing it at Temple.
The model gives Army a 62% chance here, and the stakes are plain enough. Win and Army's odds of reaching the American title game sit around 22%; lose and they fall to roughly 4%. The playoff math is a rounding error either way, about 1% with a win, 0.1% without, so treat this as a conference-standings game, not a national one. Army's league record is still 1-1, exactly where the Temple win left it (Army's fifth straight over the Owls), because the Louisiana Tech trip was nonconference. And the broader frame hasn't moved. Army is 19-8 since the start of 2024 and 12-4 in American regular-season play.
Elsewhere in the American
Charlotte at North Texas: root for Charlotte
This result carries a 7.0 percentage-point impact on Army's conference-title-game probability. Charlotte is a long shot here.
North Texas is one of the conference's best bets to take a championship-game spot, and Charlotte winning in Denton would be the single most valuable outside result of the week for Army. Worth about 7 percentage points on Army's title-game odds, roughly 22% in that branch against about 15% if North Texas wins. The catch is that Charlotte's chance of pulling it off is about 2%. North Texas is a 20-point-plus home favorite, which is how the least likely result on Army's board ends up carrying the biggest swing on it. Kickoff is 3:30 p.m. ET on ESPN+.
UAB at Memphis: root for UAB
More plausible and worth less. UAB has roughly a 15% shot at Memphis, and a Blazers upset would put Army's title-game odds near 17% rather than about 14%, a 2.7-point swing. The appeal is partly selfish beyond the standings. Army visits Memphis on October 30, and a Memphis team with a conference loss already on the ledger is a better team to catch. Kickoff is 7 p.m. ET on ESPN2.
Full numbers and the rest of the slate are in the interactive guide, and the simulation behind them is explained in the methodology.