Ahead of Navy football’s high-stakes game against Army, Colin Ramos took time to reflect on his four-year career in Annapolis.
The 5-foot-11, 209-pound senior linebacker has notched 110 tackles, 46 solo tackles and three sacks this season. Ramos has recorded 32 tackles in three games against the Black Knights, including 16 a year ago. On Dec. 14 at Northwest Stadium in Landover, he will look to beat Army for the first time since his freshman year in 2021.
“This game is so special. It’s just crazy how fast time has gone by. This game is everything to the Academy, everything to us football players,” Ramos said on Glenn Clark Radio Dec. 12. “We work every single day, starting in the offseason, to beat Army. We’ve had a good season but I want to make it a great season this Saturday.”
Army-Navy has been an iconic college football matchup for more than 100 years. This weekend, the two teams meet for the 125th time, with Navy leading the all-time series 62-55-7. For Ramos, recent contests highlight the thin margin for error that can define the outcome in these highly competitive games.
The Mids fell to the Black Knights 20-17 in 2022 and 17-11 in 2023.
“This game always just comes down to basically two things, physicality and execution of your details,” Ramos said. “So whatever team can do that better usually wins. The last two years I think we haven’t executed as good as we need to, and you need to be almost perfect in these games. One little mistake — it could be a touchdown, it could be a fumble, it could be anything, so execution and physicality are going to be huge.”
Army enters the game with an 11-1 record. Black Knights quarterback Bryson Daily has delivered a historic performance this season, running for 29 touchdowns. He is two shy of the FBS record by a quarterback (31 by Navy’s Keenan Reynolds in 2013).
For Ramos, the focus is on setting the tone early and forcing the Black Knights out of their game plan.
“Their offense is good. They’ve got a good offensive line, obviously a good quarterback, good skill positions. They’re physical,” Ramos said. “You know what they’re going to do. It’s ultimately about stopping them. They want to turn zero-yard carries into 1-2 yards, leaning forward. We want to knock them back. We want to set them back, set them off schedule. But they’re a good football team. It’s going to be a challenge. It’s going to be a downhill, traditional football game. There’s nothing better than this.”
Navy (8-3) will face Oklahoma in the Armed Forces Bowl on Dec. 27 following the Army game. The Mids’ successful campaign comes after four consecutive losing seasons.
This season has been a testament to the leadership and vision of Navy’s senior class. Ramos and his teammates focused on uniting the team and reclaiming the program’s tradition of success, a journey they aim to complete with a strong finish to the 2024 season.
“We kind of just talked about what kind of legacy we want to leave behind — how we wanted to get Navy football back on track, back into the winning record this program has been known for so many years,” Ramos said. “To have this kind of season where we’re getting the team back on track, we’re having that winning, the success that we have been wanting, that we deserve with the work that we have been putting in, it’s been pretty awesome, but we’ve got to cap it off this Saturday.”
It’s a challenging transition to adjust to life at Navy, demanding resilience and adaptability. For Ramos, the Academy’s rigorous environment has meant everything, creating personal growth and preparing him for future success.
Ramos service selected Marine Corps as his next challenge in life. For him, it closely mirrors the camaraderie and structure of football, making it a natural fit for his next chapter after the academy.
“Over your time at the Academy, you go through a ton of different trainings with a ton of different communities. The trainings with the Marine Corps always stuck out to me the most,” Ramos said. “I always had the most fun, found the most interest in them, just the physical nature of the Marine Corps. I think it’s the closest aspect to being on a team, like a football team, and a lot of the guys on the football team usually go to the Marine Corps. I’ve had a lot of great guys that I’ve played with that have gone to the Marine Corps. I’ve talked to them. I just think it just matched perfectly.”
For more from Ramos, listen to the full interview here:
Photo Credit: Kenya Allen/PressBox