Army went for 2 to win the Armed Forces Bowl and had the same number of 1st downs as SDSU had plays

This one was a thriller.

Army beat San Diego State 42-35 in the 2017 Armed Forces Bowl from Fort Worth, Texas on Saturday. The game went back and forth all afternoon, but Army scored a touchdown with less than a minute left, and then it went for two to win it.

What’s pretty remarkable about this game was Army’s control on offense. To put it into perspective, Army had the same number of first downs — 31 — as SDSU had plays.

The time of possession numbers are astounding — the Black Knights had the ball for 46:00. Not to mention Army ran 91 plays, including 87 rushes, which is almost a DI record — 1968 Missouri has that single-game record, with 99 rushes against Colorado. The Black Knights finished with 440 yards rushing on the day.

Yes, that’s precisely the way head coach Jeff Monken wants to control the pace while running his speed-option scheme — using the ground game to eat up as much clock as possible. Army’s celebration after the victory was pretty cool:

The fact that the Aztecs were able to stay competitive with those kinds of Army numbers is impressive, and this game came down to the wire.

With 5:47 left, SDSU running back Rashaad Penny led a scoring drive to give his team a 35-28 lead.

Penny had himself a day. In the third quarter, he gave the Aztecs their first lead since early in the second quarter with a 49-yard touchdown to go up 28-21, his third score of the day. He finished with 221 yards and four touchdowns on just 14 carries, and he joined some elite company to have five straight games with over 200 yards.

This game was pretty fun throughout, and a couple of key big moments from the game were wonky — early in the fourth quarter, the two sides both threw interceptions on back-to-back possessions. First, SDSU picked off Army on an attempted trick play:

And even though the Aztecs had the ball deep in Army territory, the Black Knights got the ball back quickly. SDSU quarterback Christian Chapman threw an interception that was picked off by Army’s Alex Aukerman off a great deflection by Jaylon McClinton.

For Army, the Black Knights finish with 10 wins for the first time since 1996, and now have back-to-back bowl victories.

SDSU fought hard and shouldn’t hang their heads, given that it was dominated in time of possession and stayed in the game throughout. Penny performing the way he did has to make the loss a little less painful, too.