College football 2020: Ranking the 3 worst losses from Week 1

2. Middle Tennessee shut out at Army

While Southern Miss had problems being a favor, their conference foe in the Middle Tennessee Blue Raiders had a different problem. The Blue Raiders came in as a 3.5-point underdog to the Army Black Knights, after promising a better season than their 4-8 record last year.

This game was originally the Blue Raiders traveling to face Duke before the ACC made their teams play a conference-only schedule.

The Black Knights dominated the Blue Raiders from start to finish. This was Army’s first shutout home victory since 2011 when they beat Fordham with a 55-0 score. Middle Tennessee was out-gained in total yards accounted for 368-184 as well as first downs accounted for 24-13. Army forced four turnovers from the Blue Raiders. The Black Knights took a 21-0 lead into halftime and then scored 14 more points in the third quarter.

The Blue Raiders’ inexperienced and young defense could not stop the Black Knights’ triple-option offense throughout the entire game. Army was 13-for-15 on third-down conversions against the Blue Raiders’ defense.

Middle Tennessee’s offense did not put their defense in any favor positions either as they were unable to capitalize on most of their drives. The Blue Raiders only had seven total drives in the game with four of them ending in turnovers as well as failing to score in the red zone right before halftime.

The Blue Raiders averaged 3.1 yards per rush as their backs could not find a proper running lane. They took out their starting quarterback Asher O’Hara after throwing for two interceptions, a QBR of 19.4, and 46 yards on 16 completions.

The Blue Raiders (0-1) will have the week off from a game before they host the Troy Trojans on Sept. 19.