Navy's season opener never looked in doubt for long — the Midshipmen leaned on the run until Towson had no answer left.
Navy piled up 506 rushing yards and scored all 6 of its touchdowns on the ground, and the headline number belongs to Braxton Woodson. In his first game as the full-time starter, Woodson carried 23 times for 200 yards and 3 touchdowns, stepping into a role that opened up when Blake Horvath graduated. This was the version of Navy that went 11-2 and 7-1 in conference play a season ago, closing out with a 4-game winning streak that included wins over Army and Cincinnati in the Liberty Bowl. A new quarterback, same operation.
+Coming off an 11-2 season with a 7-1 conference mark
+Returns 11 starters and a proven, physical triple-option system
−Breaking in a new starting quarterback in Woodson
−Lost its top backs and receivers from last year's group
Towson came in 6-6 and 4-4 in CAA play a season ago, and the gap in size and depth showed up fast against an FBS academy program built to wear teams down over four quarters. The Tigers' defense had no real counter for Navy's option, giving up 506 yards on the ground before the final whistle. Towson still found ways to move the ball in stretches — enough to keep the score respectable into the second quarter — but never came close to threatening the outcome.
The line score tells the story of a game that tilted hard after halftime. Navy scored on offense in every quarter, while Towson's best stretch came in the second quarter before the game settled into what it always looked like it would be: a lopsided, clock-eating win for the home team.
For Navy, the takeaway is that the machine still runs without Horvath at the controls — Woodson looked comfortable carrying the load in his first start, and the offensive line did the same clock-chewing work it's built its identity on for years. For Towson, this was always going to be a measuring-stick loss against a team playing a different level of football, and the film will matter more for what it says about the Tigers' CAA slate ahead than for anything that happened in Annapolis.
