Navy (2-3) will head to North Carolina this Saturday to take on the Charlotte 49ers (1-4). Both teams come into this game really looking for a win to keep their season on the right tracks. A loss here for either team could knock them out of bowl contention.
For Navy, they’ll be looking to build on the momentum they gained from a home win against North Texas last weekend. Head coach Brian Newberry spoke on the importance of getting off to a quick start in his weekly press conference. “After you get a win like that, you hope it’s something you can build on, give your players a little confidence” Newberry said.
The 49ers have a new head coach this season in Biff Poggi. In case you are unfamiliar with the name, Poggi has to be the most interesting head coach in football. Poggi grew up in a lower-middle class household in Baltimore’s Little Italy district. He would be expelled from eight different schools by 11th grade.
Poggi would however start playing football at the Gilman School in Baltimore, a prestigious all boys catholic school. He would go on to sign to play college football at Pittsburgh where he would become teammates with Dan Marino.
After college, Poggi would go on to a career as a successful hedge fund manager where he would make millions. But after retiring from the business world, he returned to football where he became the head coach of the Gilman School (1996-2015) and Baltimore Saint Francis Academy (2017-2020) for over 20 years. While at the two schools, he would pour millions of dollars into each program to help better serve their athletes.
In 2021 he would join Jim Harbaugh’s coaching staff at the University of Michigan where he worked for two seasons as an off-field analyst. He then left for the head coaching position at Charlotte prior to the start of this season. He reportedly is donating his $500,000 salary back to the program to help increase the pay for his assistant coaches.
Charlotte Schematics
You can see some of Michigan Football’s philosophies in Charlotte’s playing style. They run many of the same formations and schemes that Michigan does. They like to run the ball, particularly on first down.
Offensively, they’re a team that runs a lot of 11 and 12 personnel. Over the last three games, they’ve run the ball 63% of the time on the first play of drives. As coach Newberry said this week, they’re a big physical team up front at the offensive line position. They’ve also got an athletic QB in Jalon Jones who can run the ball and extend plays.
Charlotte also has the versatility to be able to play both spread and heavy formations. This allows them to exploit different matchups from game to game and puts pressure on opposing defenses.
On defense they primarily run a 4-2-5. They have the ability to disguise blitzes and coverages. Like Michigan, they’re also very multiple in what they do, running a wide variety of coverages and blitzes. They’ll run a lot of zone, man, and zone-match schemes. This means that they can confuse offenses and passing the ball against them can be very difficult for an inexperienced QB.
Navy Keys to Success
Charlotte has a really talented head coach and some talented power 5 transfers. They struggle with depth and overall talent which is why they are just 1-4 on the season. This will still be a really tough game for the Midshipmen, especially playing on the road.
First, Navy has to eliminate the penalties. The last two weeks alone they’ve had 15 penalties for a total of 113 yards. Navy isn’t a team that’s built to play behind schedule and they’ll have to be more disciplined to stay in this game.
Navy will also have to play strong against the run on first and second down. Over the past three games, Charlotte has thrown the ball on third and long (6+ yards) 89% of the time. If Navy can stuff the run on early downs they’ll create chances for their pass rush to get pressure and force sacks and turnovers.
Lastly, Navy needs to execute well running the triple option. This one may seem obvious, but Charlotte is likely going to try and extend possessions to give their defense extra rest. The counter to this is that Navy needs to maintain possession themselves and keep the Charlotte defense on the field. This game could easily turn into a low scoring ball possession match.
This is definitely a winnable game for Navy, but it’s going to take everything they’ve got. Kickoff is at 2 pm Est on ESPN+
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