Not a subscriber to GBK? There’s no better time than now, as the Black Knights have kicked-off of their 2016 Army football season with a 1-0 start as Army took down Temple, 28-13.
GoBlackKnights.com continues its pre-game previews of the Army Black Knights’ opponents of the 2016 season, with a look the opponent in the first home game, the Rice Owls.
When: Saturday, September 10th at Michie Stadium (West Point, NY)
Series Record: Rice leads in the series 4-1-1 with wins in the two most recent games.
Last Meeting: October 24, 2015 at Rice Stadium. The game was played in a driving rain as Hurricane Patricia approached Houston. Rice had a week off to prepare for the Army game and took advantage.
Rice got off to a 14-0 lead in the first quarter after Schurr fumbled on Army’s first play of the game to give Rice the ball on the Army 23, but Army closed the gap to 24-14 at the half and scored again in the third quarter to close the gap to 24-21. Rice scored early in the fourth quarter, but the Black Knights bounced back to within 3 with 6 minutes left in the game. Rice turned the ball over on a fumble at their own 10, but the Rice defense held Army to a 19 yard FG to tied the game at 31-31, and with 2:13 left on the clock. Rice drove 75 yards in 7 plays for the winning TD as Zach Wright caught a 12 yard pass from Driphus Jackson with 24 seconds left on the clock to give Rice a 38-31 win over the Black Knights. Schurr had one of his typical bad weather games, going 2-8 passing and coughing the ball up a couple of times in the rain.
Rice’s Record
2016: Rice opened their 2016 season with a 46-14 loss to Western Kentucky in Bowling Green. Rice was unable to contain the WKU passing game, allowing them to gain 552 yards through the air. Neither team was able to generate an effective running game with both teams averaging 3.2 yards per attempt. QB Tyler Stehling was the leading rusher for Rice with 85 of their 105 rushing yards, mostly on scrambles rather than designed plays. RB Darik Dillard gained 19 yards on 9 attempts. Stehling completed 22 of 37 passing attempts for 183 yards with 2 INTs and no TDs. Neither team recorded a sack in the game. Rice fumbled twice but recovered both times. WKU had no turnovers.
2015: Rice posted a 5-7 record and was outscored 430 to 313.
Opened the season with a 56-16 drubbing of FCS opponent, Wagner
Lost 42-28 to Texas in Austin
Won 38-24 win over North Texas
Crushed 70-17 by Baylor in Waco
Lost 49-10 to Western Kentucky
Edged Florida Atlantic 27-26 in Boca Raton
Topped Army 38-31
Lost to Louisiana Tech 42-17
Lost to UTEP 24-21
Lost to Southern Miss 65-10
Lost to UTSA 34-24
Closed out their season with a 27-7 win over UNC Charlotte
Rice Offense (7 returning starters)
Rice runs a pro style spread offense with a tight end who lines up like a slotback rather than an extra lineman, 3 wide receivers and one running back.
2015 Stats: Rice averaged 26.1 points per game to rank 87th in Scoring Offense in 2015. They ranked 58th in Rushing Offense with an average of 4.0 yds per rushing attempt and 65th in Passing Offense with and average of 7.2 yds per passing attempt. They had 532 rushing attempts and 373 passing attempts in 2015.
Quarterback: Rice lost talented starter Driphus Jackson to graduation. RS-Sr Tyler Stehling took over from Jackson this spring. Stehling has 5 games experience, and a limited passing record in 2015, with 24 completions in 48 attempts for 320 yards, including 2 INTs and 1 TD. Stehling’s backup is RS Fr JT Granato.
Running Backs: Rice has all 4 of its top running backs returning from 2015, led by RS-Sr Darik Dillard 5-10, 215 lbs. (698 yards in 135 attempts). Rice is hoping to get a rebound year from Sr Jowan Davis, who was bothered by injuries and ran for only 236 yards in 2015 year after rushing for 956 yards in 2014.
Receivers: Three of Rice’s 5 top receivers return from 2015, led by RS-Sr Zach Wright (39 receptions for 554 yards and 5 TDs), RS-Jr Temi Alaka (27 catches for 303 yds) and RS-Soph Parker Smith (16 receptions for 135 yards). Rice has two experienced TEs in 260 lb RS-Sr Connor Cella (13 receptions for 209 yards) and RS-So Cole Hunt (9 receptions for 71 yards).
Offensive Line: Rice lost 2 of its 5 starters on the offensive line including 3 year starting center Andre Reue and 3 year starting tackle Caleb Williams. Returning on the OL are 280 lb RS-Soph Calvin Anderson (12 starts) at LT, a pre-season selection for All-C-USA. 305 lb RS-Jr Peter Godber (12 starts) returns at LG, and 305 lb RS-Jr Trey Martin (12 starts) returns at Center. 295 lb RS-Soph Sam Pierce (2 starts) is expected to start at RT, while 300 lb RS-Sr Connor Patterson (no starts) is expected to start at RG.
Rice Defense (7 returning starters)
Rice plays a 3 or 4 man defensive line last year with 2 large DTs flanked by lighter hybrid DE/LB types at the defensive end positions. One of the DEs (Derek Brown) may line up in the down position or 2 point LB. Like a few of their C-USA opponents, Rice likes to employasssa 5 defensive backs, leaving them with just 2 LBs.
2015 Stats: Rice surrendered an average of 35.8 points per game to rank 108th in Scoring Defense. Rice gave up an average of 5.1 yards per rushing attempt to rank 88th in Rushing Defense and they allowed 10.0 yards per passing attempt to rank 101st in Pass Defense.
Defensive Line: Only one of last year’s starting four DLs, 230 lb Sr Derek Brown, is back on top of the depth chart at one DE, but 240 lb RS-Jr Graysen Schantz, is expected to return at the other DE spot after missing most of 2015 with an ACL injury. Schantz earned Freshman All-C-USA honors two years ago. Rice lost their big NT Ross Winship and he was replaced by 290 lb Soph NT Zach Abercrumbia who saw action in 11 games last season. Another sophomore, 280 lb Carl Thompson who saw action in 10 games with 10 tackles, is expected to start at DT.
LBs: Sr Alex Lyons, a pre-season selection for All conference, returns as the undisputed leader of the defense at MLB. Lyons comes into his senior season with 198 career tackles and is entering his third year as a starter. The other LB spot was claimed by Jr Emmanuel Ellerbe this spring. Ellerbe has appeared in 25 games with no starts.
Defensive Backs: RS-Sr Tabari McGaskey, Rice’s 2d leading tackler, was moved to strong safety this spring after playing 32 games at LB. Returning Soph Free Safety JT Ibe returns with 9 career starts after missing spring practice due to surgery. RS-Soph Nickel back (KAT) JP Thompson returns along with Senior CB JT Blasingame who has missed a lot of time due to injuries in his career. Junior CB VJ Banks sat out spring practice, but is on the top of the depth chart at CB with 31 career games on his record.
Rice Special Teams
Sophomore Hayden Tobola joined the team in 2015 as a walk-on before fall camp and went on to convert 8-of-13 field-goal attempts including 2 of 2 from 40-49 yards. Soph Jack Fox is slated to take over the punting duties replacing James Farrimond. Soph Austin Walter, who averaged 21.7 yards on kickoffs will most likely handle the return duties again.
2016 Season Outlook
The Rice Owls were picked to finish third in Conference USA's West Division. Southern Miss was picked first, followed by (2) Louisiana Tech, (3) Rice, (4) UTEP, (5) UTSA and (6) North Texas in the voting.
With 14 of 22 starters returning, one might expect a better season from Rice, but that is likely to depend on whether Stehling becomes a suitable replacement for QB Driphus Jackson, who led the offense for the past three years. The defense is expected to see some much needed improvement with 7 of 11 starters returning.
Outlook for the Game
CFN picked the game with Army as Rice’s key game for the season. We don’t see Army picked as the key game for most teams, other than the traditional game with Navy; so it highlights the importance of this contest for both teams. Army West Point played well in Houston last year, despite hurricane conditions; and while the Rice defense is likely to be improved somewhat, it won’t be near the level of defense that Army faced the last time Rice played in Michie. The lack of experience at NT and DT for Rice should provide opportunities for Monken’s new and improved version of the triple option, led by the hard running of Andy Davidson and the blocking of a more experienced offensive line.
We haven’t seen enough of Stehling to determine whether he is as much of a threat as Dryphus Jackson posed the last couple of meetings between these two teams, but we suspect to see some dropoff in performance, and with a couple of new offensive linemen protecting him, the experienced Army defense should be able to hold its own. Most of all, we don’t expect to see a repeat of last year’s defensive collapse, when the defense allowed a closing minutes 75 yard TD drive. The defense established their credentials against Temple and just needs to continue that same level of intensity and focus.
This will be one of the games that could spell the difference between ending the season in early December of heading on to a bowl appearance. Rice is one of those below average FBS teams that Army needs to beat fairly regularly to regain respectability. Coming off the big upset of Temple the Black Knights need to avoid a letdown.
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