09/19/2025
Army Hosts Scoring Powerhouse
North Texas in Saturday Match Up
By John Chuhran for CaMMVets Media
West Point, N.Y. – When thinking about the United States Army, the word “underdog” does not usually come to mind. But in Saturday’s football game between North Texas (3-0) and the Black Knights (1-1), the visitors to West Point might be considered to be the favorites.
So far in 2025, the Mean Green has been one of the most exciting teams in college football, averaging 46 points per game (sixth-best in the nation). In two of their three wins, the team from Texas has scored at least 51 points.
Army Head Coach Jeff Monken is definitely not taking North Texas lightly. The game marks the beginning of the American Athletic Conference portion of the schedules for both teams. Kickoff is set for 12 noon Saturday (TV on CBS Sports Network).
“As we go through the schedule,” Monken said, “and we look and see where we’ve got to travel to and who's coming in here and just the ability of those teams – how well coached they are, how athletic they are, the history of those programs – it’s not easy. It’s not an easy schedule – it’s not an easy league.
“North Texas is really tough – (they have a) high-powered offense and they’ve been playing great on defense. Their scoring margin – what they're scoring on offense versus what they're giving up on defense – is one of the best in FBS football. It's really impressive (an average margin of 26 points –including a 3-point win in overtime at Western Michigan). They're well coached, they're fast and athletic, and we're going to have to play really, really well if we're going to even be able to challenge them in the game this Saturday.”
The 3-0 start by the Mean Green is the team’s best beginning since 2018. Last week, they claimed a dominant 59-10 win over Washington State. The North Texas defense forced five turnovers that led to 28 points. On offense, redshirt freshman quarterback Drew Mestemaker threw for 211 yards and a career-high four touchdowns on 24-of-29 passing.
“I hope he doesn't have those stats against us,” Monken said. “If he does, it's going to be a long day for the Black Knights. Here's a guy you read about that hadn’t started a game since, what, the ninth grade? At quarterback? And he earns the job as a freshman coming out of the off-season? I mean, he’s really impressive and he's played 3 great football games – very impressive.
“Their linemen do an unbelievable job protecting that guy; I mean, he has time, he's on the move. They’ve got a host of receivers and a really good group of backs. They just do a really, really good job offensively.
“Then on defense, their coordinator (Skyler Cassity), who came from Sam Houston (State), brought some players with him and they are all on the same page. They’re playing really, really well – (giving up) less than 2 touchdowns a game, 13 point something, I think. It’s really impressive. So they’ve got a good, all-around football team and it's gonna be a heck of a challenge for us to start the American (Athletic Conference play) with what I think is one of the best teams in the league.”
Army is coming off a comeback, 24-21 win at Kansas State two weeks ago. While that victory – Army’s first over a Big12 opponent since 2006 (a 27-24 overtime triumph against Baylor) – was satisfying, it was also costly.
“Coming off the game in Kansas,” Monken said, “we were just a little banged up. It was a really physical game, particularly for the guys on offense; they played 82 snaps. (Running Back) Jake Rendina is probably going to take a little bit longer to get healthy, (Running Back) Hayden (Reed) we're optimistic he's going to play on Saturday. Dewayne Coleman (Quarterback, who sustained a leg injury near the end of regulation play in Army’s game 1 loss to Tarleton State) is practicing again, so he's back to a better health. We’ll see today and tomorrow and Thursday as we're practicing if he's back to a 100 pct. or full speed, but he a looks good and the training staff is really encouraged with where he is right now. Those guys are the guys that stand out.”
Coleman, a senior, earned the starting quarterback job coming out of training camp and was the field leader for almost the entire duration of the season-opening contest before hobbling off the field with a leg injury. He did not play in the win over Kansas State and Cale Hellums took the snaps in his starting debut.
Getting more comfortable and more accurate as the game progressed, Hellums, a 5-foot-10, 205-pound junior from Tomball, TX, gained confidence and played better as the game progressed. He finished with a record 41 rushes – the most ever by a West Point player in a single game – that produced a game-leading 124 running yards and two touchdown runs. He balanced that with seven completions from 11 attempts for 43 yards and the first Army TD. On Monday, Monken announced during a radio interview that Hellums would start against North Texas.
“It’s hard to argue with his (Hellums’) performance at Kansas State,” Monken said, “and the way he ran the ball and led our team. He's completely healthy. Dewayne went into the game against Kansas State prepared to play a backup role and go into the game if we needed him to. But (when we consider) the 100 pct. health of our guys, sometimes that makes a difference on where they stand on the depth chart as well. So it’s a combination of both (performance and health).
“We didn't go into the (K-State) game anticipating he was going carry it 41 times, but we didn't know we'd have it 82 times, either. We were able to control the football and kind of chew up some clock with really some short and medium gains. We didn't have a lot of big plays. I think the halfback pass (a 52-yard option pass by Noah Short to Brady Anderson) was really the only big, explosive play that we had. So, we leaned on him and we typically do that with our quarterbacks; Bryson Daily had a lot of carries a year ago and won us a lot of games.
“We rely on the quarterback to run the football. He’s a tough, rugged runner and give him credit. It's not really what he did in high school, but he's embraced who we are and what his role is and what our quarterbacks have to do. He really did a great job with it two Saturdays ago down in Manhattan (Kansas).”
The successful Army running game against Kansas State happened because of the holes that were made by the linemen. With only Center Brady Small and Right Guard Paolo Gennarelli returning as starters from last year’s FBS-best Offensive Line, the Black Knights struggled to clear a consistent path for the ball carriers in the first game loss. But against the Wildcats, the entire Army O-Line – Small, Gennarelli, Henry Appleton, Will Jeffcoat, Teddy Williams, Xavier Archawski, Braden Batosh, Kyle Kioska, Lane Parks, and Tyler Lee – fought hard and created the gaps that produced the victory.
“When we lose a game,” Monken said, “we're humbled and we really focus on looking at the things that we can improve on and probably self evaluate more critically than we would if we win. So, I think they criticized themselves pretty harshly and probably had some coaches that were pretty critical of their performance and their fundamentals. They worked really hard that week to improve those and so I think that was the difference – we just played better fundamentally and probably played a little more physical and harder.”
Injuries to other Army players still leave question marks that only game play will answer.
“There’s been some others with nicks and dings. Cody Harris-Miller (starting Defensive Lineman), who was out against Kansas State, will be out again this week but other than that we're trying to nurse everybody else back to where they were. It's hard during the season. Guys play, they have injuries, they get beat up and banged up in the game and then you kind of nurse them back to health and get them to the next Saturday and the same thing happens all over again.
“Sometimes a two-week break helps us get a little more healthy. The bye weeks are beneficial. It's just to get healthy. No other real significance other than it's nice to have two weeks to prepare for an opponent, to get more game-plan stuff in.”
The Army game plan will be designed to limit North Texas opportunities. Last year, the Mean Green entered the game against Army with a similar high-scoring team that played explosive, big-play football that was averaging 40.6 points per game, 527.6 total yards per game, and 371.6 passing ypg.
But Army’s talented defense executed the fundamentals when it counted, holding North Texas to a field goal on the first possession of the game, shutting the Mean Green out the rest of the day while limiting them to 283 total yards and just 214 passing yards. Add in the relentless, clock-chewing, running-dominated Black Knights offense that kept possession of the ball for more than 41 minutes to claim a 14-3 win. North Texas did not have the time to find a rhythm and mount a serious touchdown drive.
Army is likely planning to try to do the same thing on Saturday that they did last year against the Mean Green and that they did two weeks ago against Kansas State (when Army controlled the clock for more than 40 minutes – including limiting the Wildcats to just 3:01 of possession in the second half. It was the shortest second-half TOP by any FBS team in 15 years).
“We have to play our game,” Monken said. “It's the team that scores the most points that wins. All you’ve got to do is score more than your opponent. It doesn’t mean you’ve got to score 40 or 50 to win the game – it might take 40 or 50 to win, but it might not. So, we have to play our game. And there's a lot of really good teams in this league. Just look at the talent level in this league, the history of the winning teams – this is a difficult, challenging conference.
“I don't know if there really is another story beyond (improving) the fundamentals. We just did a much better job of blocking up front, blocking the perimeter, controlling the ball on offense (against Kansas State). Defensively, it was as good a job of tackling as we've ever done since I've been here. We missed just 3 tackles on defense, which is unheard of, and our guys just really played well fundamentally.
“We played physical and rugged and it was just enough to get us to win. Like I said – just enough. That's the margin for us. We've got to play almost perfect, we've got to play really well fundamentally and things have got to go our way. They all did the last time out, so, hopefully, we'll make some improvements and be able to put together a performance on Saturday that's good enough for us to win.”
(-CaMMVets Media-)
Talk with Army QB Cale Hellums
