A long, unconventional football season for the Army Black Knights hasn’t been without its challenges, even in postseason preparations.

The Black Knights will soon head to Memphis, Tenn., for Thursday’s Liberty Bowl against West Virginia, hoping to secure their third 10-win season in head coach Jeff Monken’s tenure. Army’s coming into the game on a three-game win streak, but with less practice time than usual for a bowl-bound team.

“We got our team back and reconvened on the practice field yesterday,” Monken said Tuesday during a virtual media session. “We obviously won't have a lot of time to prepare for this game – just again this afternoon and [Wednesday] before we travel to Memphis to play the game.”

The game kicks off at 4 p.m. Thursday in Memphis. The Black Knights have won their last four bowl games, with the last coming two years ago in the Armed Forces Bowl.

It’s safe to assume that Army’s happy to have a bowl game in which to play. Initially, they’d accepted a bid to the Independence Bowl against an undetermined Pac-12 Conference opponent; however, with a lack of opponents available due to a number of programs opting out of the postseason with COVID-19 concerns, that bowl game was canceled.

Enter the Liberty Bowl, and the Mountaineers of the Big 12.

West Virginia (5-4) hasn’t won a game away from Morgantown, W. Va., this season, and hasn’t played since Dec. 5, a 42-6 loss at Iowa State. The Mountaineers are a much more pass-reliant team than the Black Knights, averaging more than 277 yards in the air per game. That pass game is led by quarterback Jarret Doege, who’s thrown 13 touchdown passes and just three interceptions in a truncated 2020 season.

Army (9-2), meanwhile, has run its usual triple-option offense with plenty of ground success, rushing for 281.3 yards per game. Sophomore QB Tyhier Tyler is the team’s leading rusher with 552 yards, and was under center for the 15-0 win over rival Navy, but six QBs have taken snaps for Army this season, including Christian Anderson, who took over in the second quarter of a come-from-behind win over Air Force when Tyler was hurt.

“They are just a strong, stout defense, so it will be a challenge to run the ball against a defense that we know is very good at stopping the run,” Monken said. “We don't know a lot about them. We don't play them every year and obviously for our offense to play them defensively is rolling the dice.

"We have to prepare for a lot of different things and see if they settle in to one thing or if they're doing a lot of different things to try to defend us.”

A win would give Monken his 50th at Army since taking the helm in 2014.