4. Navy College Football Preview 2021: Defense
– The defense got steamrolled over by BYU to start the season, it struggled over the first half of the year against the better ground attacks, and it was too late when the production started to come at the end.
There wasn’t any pretense of a pass rush – just six sacks and 45 tackles for loss in the ten games – but the bigger problem was holding up against the more powerful teams. There isn’t a whole lot of size on the front three around 6-0, 280-pound sophomore Donald Barniard, but as always, there will be a steady rotation.
– The linebacking corps has a star in Diego Fagot in the middle, and he’s not alone with the entire corps expected back. The youth movement led to a slew of mistakes early on, but again, the D got better as the season went on. Watch out for this to be one of the team’s bigger areas of improvement.
– The pass defense had its rough spots, and it only picked off three passes, but it wasn’t the main problem on the struggling D. The linebacking corps should go from good to great, but the secondary won’t be that much further behind with all the key parts expected to be back. Considering there’s no help from a pass rush, these defensive backs were okay. Now they’re proven veterans.