The 2023 Armed Forces Bowl was a

college football College football is gridiron football that is played by teams of amateur Student athlete, student-athletes at universities and colleges. It was through collegiate competition that gridiron football American football in the United States, firs ...

bowl game In North America, a bowl game, or simply bowl, is one of a number of postseason college football games primarily played by NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) teams. For most of its history, the FBS did not use a playoff tourname ...

played on December 23, 2023, at Amon G. Carter Stadium in

Fort Worth, Texas Fort Worth is a city in the U.S. state of Texas and the county seat of Tarrant County, Texas, Tarrant County, covering nearly into Denton County, Texas, Denton, Johnson County, Texas, Johnson, Parker County, Texas, Parker, and Wise County, Te ...

. The 21st annual

Armed Forces Bowl The Armed Forces Bowl, formerly the Fort Worth Bowl from 2003 to 2005, is an annual postseason college football bowl game. First played in 2003, the game is normally held at the 45,000-seat Amon G. Carter Stadium on the campus of Texas Christian ...

featured the

Air Force Falcons The Air Force Falcons are the College athletics in the United States, intercollegiate athletic teams that represent the United States Air Force Academy, located in El Paso County, Colorado north of Colorado Springs, Colorado, Colorado Springs. Th ...

of the

Mountain West Conference The Mountain West Conference (MW) is a collegiate athletic conference in the Western United States, participating in NCAA Division I. Its football teams compete in the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS). The MW officially began operations on Ja ...

and the

James Madison Dukes The James Madison Dukes are the college sports in the United States, intercollegiate athletics teams that represent James Madison University (JMU), in Harrisonburg, Virginia. The name "Dukes" is derived from Samuel Page Duke, the university's se ...

of the

Sun Belt Conference The Sun Belt Conference (SBC) is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference that has been affiliated with the National Collegiate Athletic Association, NCAA's NCAA Division I, Division I since 1976. Originally a non-football confe ...

. The game begin at approximately 2:30 p.m. CST and was aired on

ABC ABC are the first three letters of the Latin script. ABC or abc may also refer to: Arts, entertainment and media Broadcasting * Aliw Broadcasting Corporation, Philippine broadcast company * American Broadcasting Company, a commercial American ...

. The Armed Forces Bowl was one of the 2023–24 bowl games concluding the 2023 FBS football season. The game was sponsored by aerospace and defense company

Lockheed Martin The Lockheed Martin Corporation is an American Arms industry, defense and aerospace manufacturer with worldwide interests. It was formed by the merger of Lockheed Corporation with Martin Marietta on March 15, 1995. It is headquartered in North ...

and was officially known as the Lockheed Martin Armed Forces Bowl.

Teams

The game featured the

from the

and the

from the

. This was the first time that James Madison and Air Force played each other.

James Madison Dukes

The Dukes entered the game ranked 24th in the AP poll with an 11–1 record (7–1 in Sun Belt games), having finished atop their conference's East Division. Because this was the final year of a two-year transition from the

Football Championship Subdivision The NCAA Division I Football Championship Subdivision (FCS), formerly known as Division I-AA, is the second-highest level of college football in the United States, after the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision, Football Bowl Subdivision (F ...

, James Madison was not originally bowl-eligible, with waiver requests denied by the NCAA in August and November. However, because of an insufficient number of bowl-eligible teams available to fill all bowl games, the Dukes were ultimately granted a berth. This was the first bowl game in James Madison school history.

Air Force Falcons

The Falcons entered the game with an 8–4 record (5–3 in Mountain West games), tied for fourth place in their conference. They started their season with eight consecutive wins, culminating with a win over

Colorado State Colorado State University (Colorado State or CSU) is a public land-grant research university in Fort Collins, Colorado, United States. It is the flagship university of the Colorado State University System. It was founded in 1870 as Colorado Agr ...

, which was ranked 19th in the AP poll, but then lost their final four games of the regular season. This was Air Force's seventh Armed Forces Bowl, extending their record for most appearances in the game. Entering the game, the Falcons had a 2–4 record in prior editions of the game, having most recently appeared in the 2022 edition, which they won.

Game summary

Statistics

References

External links

Game statistics
at statbroadcast.com {{James Madison Dukes bowl game navbox

Armed Forces Bowl

Air Force Falcons football bowl games James Madison Dukes football bowl games