Westy’s & the Army-Navy Rivalry
Mark & Holly at the 2024 Army-Navy Game in Landover, MD.
Hello friends,
If you follow Westy’s, then you probably know we are classmates from West Point’s Class of 1991 – Duty Shall Be Done or, in Westy’s case, Drinking Shall Be Done😊
What you may not know is we both played collegiate sports at West Point. Holly played soccer and Mark played 150 lb. football, which is now known as Sprint football (Mark can explain over a beer at Westy’s if you are wondering what the heck this is).
Both of our boys followed in Mark’s footsteps and played Sprint (Keegan 2019, Kyle 2027), our daughter Lexi (2021) played women’s lacrosse, and our daughter Daisy (2029) will be playing soccer starting next fall. If you have been to our home, then you quickly realized we bleed black and gold; and at no time do we bleed black and gold more than when we play Navy. Mark was fortunate enough to beat Navy two of three contests as QB of the 150 lb. team, and although Holly never played against Navy (they did not have a collegiate team yet), she grew up with a burning passion to beat Navy because her dad is a USMA ’62 grad.
As the current head coach of the Sprint football team, it is sad to say that if Mark’s team loses to Navy, everyone in our family knows that Mark will be in a bad mood the entire next year. Winning the Gold Star against Navy ranks right up there with the birth of a child (ok, maybe we are exaggerating but not by much).
With that in mind, know that this weekend is a BIG deal for Holly and Mark, and Army Athletics. Army currently leads the “Star Series” over Navy this year by one victory, 12-11. Army has not won the Star Series since 2013-14 season and our overall record in the Star Series is 4-40-2. Not very good. We have a long way to go to make that up, but winning the Star Series this year is a step in the right direction. This Saturday, Men’s Lacrosse plays @ Navy and Women’s Lacrosse hosts Navy. Both games are at noon. Men’s Tennis hosts Navy this Saturday at 1:00 p.m. Two victories and we clinch the series outright – one win ensures a tie. Let’s go ahead and win all three!
This leads me to the point of this blog. You can expect to see your fair share of Army Navy memorabilia at Westy’s. It won’t be over-the-top, but we plan to outfit Westy’s with items such as pennants, and old Army Navy programs and posters. We will even have our own Beat Navy Tunnel for patrons to walk through – but that is all I will say about that for now…
If all goes well, we will open Westy’s around the same time the fall sports teams are starting their seasons. If all goes REALLY well, we will be celebrating many victories over Navy at Westy’s for years to come.
GO WESTY’S! GO ARMY!! BEAT NAVY!!!
Mark and Holly West
Owners
