A few years back, Army fans began referring to West Point as Fullback U. The fullback, or B-back, in Army West Point parlance, has always been the foundation of Jeff Monken’s approach to triple-option football, but it has morphed into a multi-player attack in recent years. We don’t know of another school that uses their fullbacks as much as West Point does, although Navy comes pretty close. Since 2016, fullbacks have accounted for at least 40 percent of the rushing attempts for the Black Knight offense.
Monken had a couple of talented B-backs at Georgia State in Dominque Swope and Jerick Mckinnen who played both QB and FB for Monken. Both of them rushed for more than 1,000 yards in back-to-back seasons. McKinnen was 5-9 and 210 pounds while Swope was only slightly larger at 5-11 and 211 pounds; so they were built more like tailbacks than traditional fullbacks.
Monken’s predecessor Rich Ellerson relied more on his slotbacks running counter plays with back-to-back thousand-yard seasons from Raymond Maples and Terry Baggett, but Monken changed that upon his arrival. Monken inherited one premiere fullback in the name of Larry Dixon, who was the only B-back of the Monken era to rush for more than 1,000 yards in a season. At 5-11 and 239 pounds, Dixon was a bigger and stronger version of the two B-backs Monken employed at Georgia Southern combining power and speed while compiling multiple hundred-yard games in 2014.
Need for More Depth
One of the problems with that first Monken season was that Dixon carried too much of the load. Dixon played 562 of the 780 offensive snaps that season, and his production was somewhat reduced by wear and tear as the season wore on. The Black Knights had just two fullbacks other than Dixon who played more than a handful of snaps in 2014, and when Dixon departed, three fullbacks took up the load 2015, in what Army fans disparagingly referred to as Fullback by Committee. Aaron Kemper was the #1 fullback at 5-6 and 210 pounds. Matt Giachinta was the primary backup at 6-1 and 220 pounds, and freshman Drue Harris filled the third spot on the depth chart at 6-0 and 220 pounds.
Fullback production dropped to a collective 1,009 yards in 2015, with the three fullbacks rushing for 109 yards less than Dixon’s individual total the previous year. Army’s team rushing yardage dropped below 3000 for the first time since Ellerson brought the triple option back to West Point in 2009. Darnell Woolfolk was a freshman on the roster but, for some reason, did not have a single carry in 2015 and played only 10 snaps on offense.
The Viti Era
The following season, former Black Knights’ fullback, Mike Viti, took over assistant coaching responsibility for the fullbacks, and he put together a system that relied more on depth and specialization at the position. Andy Davidson and Cole Macek converted from linebackers to fullbacks and Darnell Woolfolk moved into the #2 spot in the depth chart behind Davidson in 2016. Viti started building for additional depth in the future by getting freshman Connor Slomka a few carries and even got senior Paul Rhoden some opportunities to carry part of the load. Three fullbacks were rotated regularly in the 2016 season, but the stage was set for building a 4 fullback rotation the following year.The fullback production jumped from 33 percent of the rushing attempts for 1009 yards in 2015 to 43 percent of the rushing attempts for 1825 yards in 2016, and the unit has continued to provide 40% percent or more of the Army’s rushing attempts and at least 36% of Army’s total rushing yards every year since.
Spreading the Load and Assigning Roles
A key factor in Viti’s approach to employing his fullbacks was spreading the load. Since 2017, no one fullback has played as many snaps as Dixon did in 2014, and all of the fullbacks have benefited from the reduced wear and tear, particularly in a 13 game season.
As Mike Viti noted in a GBK interview a couple of years ago, the fullbacks play as a unit. The yards are not individual yards, but fullback yards. Each of the fullbacks had a slightly different set of skills that Viti employed in different situations. Some, like Macek, Calen Holt, and Cade Barnard contributed more as blockers than runners. Last season we even saw Barnard line up at one of the slotback positions to have two fullbacks in the game at one time. Sandon McCoy was used in fullback sweeps and got the ball more often close to the goal line, but was also highly regarded as a lead blocker on many plays.
Reloading for 2022
As we noted in our looking Forward Series, the fullback position is one we seldom have to worry about going into spring practice in recent years, and this year should be no exception. With three top performers returning at the position, and at least 3 others chomping at the bit to move into the regular rotation.
Viti has moved to coaching the offensive line, a move that will broaden his experience, and Monken recently named Major Blake Powers to take Viti’s place coaching the fullbacks. We expect that Powers will continue the work that Viti started in maintaining the fullbacks as one of the deepest and best units on the team. His main tasks this spring will be to assess skill sets, assign roles and develop younger fullbacks to backfill the vacancies left by the graduation of Barnard and Catoe.
Jakobi Buchanan is already established as the go-to, power runner in short-yardage situations. Anthony Adkins will most likely be the primary threat running outside the tackles and poses the most likely breakaway threat at fullback. Tyson Riley is another big power runner like Buchanan, but we’ll be looking to see what special niche he will occupy in the fullback scheme. Shacori Williams has yet to establish himself in the rotation; so he’ll be competing with some of the younger players for a spot in the depth chart this spring.
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