ANNAPOLIS, Md. – The Navy men's rugby team secured its fourth-consecutive Star Match victory, defeating Army, 26-14, Saturday afternoon at the Prusmack Rugby Center in Annapolis.
The win keeps the Midshipmen at 8-0 all-time against the Black Knights and evens the season score at 1-1 in the 2026-27 Army-Navy Star Series presented by USAA.
Avion Ganse led the offensive effort with two tries for a team-high 10 points. Andrew Baublitz and Trevor Gayron also found the try zone, with Baublitz extending his streak of scoring in all four matches this year. Kade Williams anchored the kicking duties, converting three attempts to add six points.
"It's a joy to work with these young men who have such big ambition in rugby and beyond," Navy director of rugby Gavin Hickie said. "There's resilience and a desire to uphold a legacy, a burning ambition to beat Army every year and to be right up at the very top of the best teams every single year."
Army opened the scoring in the eighth minute after a physical early field position battle. Howie Heller slammed in a try at the 7:57 mark, the first surrendered try by Navy's defense all season. Nick Trout added the conversion to give the Black Knights a 7-0 advantage.
The Midshipmen responded in the 17th minute when Ganse took a pass from Sean Donohue out of a scrum and bent around the defense for his first score of the year. Williams drilled the conversion to tie the match. Ten minutes later, Baublitz pierced the defensive line up the middle following a lineout, putting Navy ahead 14-7.
The Midshipmen maintained that lead into halftime after turning away a late Army push near the try line while playing a man down due to a yellow card.
"We made a pact today that Army would have to work incredibly hard for every point," Hickie said. "I think you saw that with the multiple possessions on our try line that our defense repelled."
Both teams battled through rainy conditions and handling errors early in the second half. Navy capitalized on excellent field position in the 56th minute after an Army penalty in the scrum. Gayron took a lineout feed directly into a powerful maul and touched down to extend the lead to 19-7.
The Black Knights clawed back at 63:45 following a sustained defensive stand by the Midshipmen. Luke Leech finally broke the plane for a try and Trout's conversion cut the deficit to 19-14.
Navy stifled any further comeback attempts down the stretch. In the final minute, Ganse took an offload from Jack Skidmore out of a scrum and raced to the edge for the exclamation point, securing the 26-14 victory.
"We always get a very tough version of Army," Hickie added. "The game was in contention up until the last play of the game pretty much and we took a major step forward in terms of our own development."