The Rivalry: Mystery at the Army-Navy Game

by John Feinstein

  3. A POST ASSIGNMENT

  Stevie waited until breakfast the next morning to bring up the Washington trip to his parents. He knew his mother would need convincing, and he had been too tired when he got home from the game to start a debate.

  “How much homework do you have this weekend?” his mom asked, a predictable and reasonable first question.

  “Not much,” Stevie lied.

  His father looked at him sharply. “I thought you told me you had a paper due on Beowulf, but you’d pass on watching the football games today to get it done,” he said.

  “Well, I can still do that,” Stevie answered. “And I can do the rest on the train.”

  His parents looked at one another. Christine Thomas shrugged helplessly. “I know you’re going to let him do it, Bill,” she said. “You always do.”

  “It’s not as if he’s flunking out of school,” Bill Thomas said. “He’s making solid B’s.”

  “Which these days might get him into a solid B-grade college-but not anyplace that’s any good,” she said.

  “Mom, not everyone needs to go to an Ivy League school,” Stevie said. His dad had gone to Penn and his mother to Columbia. They had met in law school at Yale.

  “All he’s done with journalism will help him a lot, Chris,” Bill Thomas said. “Plus, can we worry about college when he’s, I don’t know, a junior?”

  “Okay, okay, I know when I’m outnumbered,” she said. “Stevie, I want to see the Beowulf paper before you get on that train.”

  “You got it, Mom.” He raced off to call Kelleher before she could change her mind.

  By ten the next morning, he was on a train out of 30th Street station. He had only written half the Beowulf paper, but the fact that it was actually pretty good rescued him. “Come home with the paper unfinished and you won’t get to work on this project,” his mother had said.

  He quickly read the sports section of the New York Times-having read the Philadelphia Inquirer at home-and then dug into his math and Spanish homework. The trip to Union Station in Washington took a little under two hours, and he was just about finished when it arrived. That left Beowulf to finish on the ride home.

  He had been in Union Station before, so he knew exactly how to work his way from the tracks through the massive building to the front door that led to the cab line. It was a cold but sunny November day, and he could see the enormous white dome of the Capitol building shining in the distance-impressive.

  He got a cab to the Washington Post offices, as Kelleher had instructed. When Stevie had called the day before to say he could come, Bobby had explained the details of the project to him.

  “We started combining some coverage with the Post about a year ago,” he said. “The point is to save money, really. Instead of both papers sending people to cover a mid-May road game for the Nationals in Chicago, one reporter goes and files for both papers. If someone writes a day story on how Maryland is getting ready to play Wake Forest in football, both papers may use it.

  “This is different, though. We both want to do blow-out coverage of Army-Navy because it’s never been in DC before and because both teams are good this year. We got lucky with that. But we don’t have as much staff as we used to before the economy slammed us and both papers had buyouts. A lot of talent walked out the doors. So the editors decided we’d work together. Which means we can team you and Susan Carol.”

  Stevie certainly liked that idea. She was the prettiest girl he’d ever met, scary smart, and she knew more about sports than he did-which could actually be a little annoying, if Stevie was honest.

  Still, she kept him on his toes, and there was nothing more fun than hanging out with her at a major event-even if they did seem to get into trouble most of the time.

  His father had once likened them to Pigpen, a character in the old “Peanuts” comic strip who went around in a swirl of dust and dirt. “That’s you and Susan Carol when it comes to trouble,” he had said. “It just follows you wherever you go.”

  The cab ride only took about ten minutes, and when he arrived at the Post, Stevie called Matt Rennie. Rennie had been Kelleher’s editor at the Washington Herald but had moved to the Post when he had been offered the number-two job on the Post’s sports staff.

  “Steve, glad you could make it,” Rennie said. “I’ll meet you in the lobby.”

  Rennie walked him through security and then brought him up to the newsroom on the fifth floor.

  “You’re the first one here,” Rennie said. “Bobby, Tamara, and Susan Carol are on their way in from Potomac. If you want, I’ll give you a quick tour.”

  Stevie loved that idea. He had recently read All the President’s Men, the book written by Post reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein about the fall of President Richard Nixon, much of it stemming from reporting they had done after the infamous 1972 break-in at the Watergate Hotel office building. He had been fascinated by the story of how Woodward and Bernstein slowly pieced the story together, beginning on the day after the break-in, when it had appeared to be little more than a routine burglary attempt.

  He knew the newspaper business had changed a lot since then, but just being in the Post newsroom gave him a thrill. It was massive-and oddly quiet.

  “Not a lot of people in this early,” Rennie said. “The dot-com people are here, and a few editors and reporters, but Sundays are normally like this. I think Woodward’s in, though. Bobby told me you wanted to meet him.”

  “Bob Woodward’s here?”

  “He was on Meet the Press this morning. He sometimes swings by for a little while on Sundays just because it’s so quiet.”

  They were walking between desks toward the back of the newsroom and Stevie was getting a little nervous. He’d met a lot of famous athletes and coaches, but Bob Woodward was the epitome of what Stevie hoped to someday be. He knew he’d never be an NFL quarterback or an NBA point guard. A top-flight journalist? Maybe.

  “Hey, Bob, you busy?” Rennie said, poking his head into an open doorway.

  “Not at all, Matt, come in,” Stevie heard a voice say from inside the door.

  “Got someone here I’d like to introduce you to,” Rennie said. “Bob Woodward, this is Steve Thomas.”

  Woodward stood up and walked around his desk, hand extended. He was medium height, with dark hair, graying at the temples. Stevie knew he was in his sixties, but he looked younger.

  “Hi, Steve, I’m Bob Woodward,” he said. “Very nice to have you here at the Post.”

  He had a friendly smile and spoke slowly in one of those flat midwestern accents. Have came out “heav.”

  “Bobby called this morning and said you might come by,” Woodward continued as they shook hands. “Why don’t you have a seat? I hear you’ve had quite a reporting career already.” Reporting came out “repording,” but what was funny was Woodward talking about Stevie’s reporting career. He was tempted to say something like “Yeah, I hear your career hasn’t been half bad either.”

  “Well, we’ve gotten lucky a few times,” he said. “Susan Carol and I, that is. She’s sort of been my partner.”

  Woodward was nodding. “I know,” he said. “I’ve read some of the stories you two have done together. Luck will carry you only so far. You two have done a lot of excellent repording.”

  “I just finished reading All the President’s Men, and I think it’s fair to say that you and Carl Bernstein did some reporting”-he almost said “repording” but caught himself-“that was pretty excellent.”

  Woodward laughed. “Now, we did get lucky,” he said. “We were lucky that Nixon and his men weren’t terribly smart.”

  “Well, it was a great book.”

  Rennie chimed in, “And then you were lucky to have Robert Redford play you in the movie version.”

  “No, that was embarrassing,” Woodward said. “The funny thing is, Dustin Hoffman actually looked a lot like Carl. Needless to say, I don’t look anything like Bob.”

  “Bob?” Stevie said.

&nb
sp; “Oh, sorry, yeah, Redford. He goes by Bob. We actually became pretty good friends. Hey, did Bobby ever tell you about the time I introduced them?”

  They were both shaking their heads now. “Bob came to see me in the newsroom one day. Bobby was walking past my office, so I waved him in and said, ‘Bobby Kelleher, meet Bob Redford.’ Bobby shook hands with him and said, ‘So, Bob, where do you work?’ ”

  “He didn’t recognize Robert Redford?” Rennie asked, clearly amazed.

  Woodward nodded. “Now, Bob is shorter in person than he seems on-screen and he was wearing glasses. But still…”

  “So what happened?” Stevie asked.

  “I said, ‘Bobby, Bob starred in your all-time favorite movie, the one you told me you saw three times in the same day.’ It took a minute, but then it dawned on him. All he could do was babble about how sorry he was after that. You don’t often see Bobby Kelleher completely flustered, but he was that time.”

  Rennie stood up. His cell phone had just gone off. “Everyone’s here,” he announced to Stevie. “Bob, I want to thank you for making my day and maybe my month with that story.”

  “Be sure to ask him about it,” Woodward said. “I’m certain he’d love to be reminded. Steve, it was a pleasure to meet you. I can’t wait to read what you come up with on this Army-Navy project.”

  “What are you working on these days?” Stevie asked, caught up in the one-reporter-to-another repartee.

  “A book on President Obama,” Woodward said.

  Should have known, Stevie thought. I write about ballplayers, he writes about presidents. “Well, good luck with it,” he said, trying to sound grown-up.

  “Thanks,” Woodward said as his phone started to ring. He looked at the phone and sighed. “It’s Joe Biden. I probably better take it.” He waved goodbye as he reached for the phone.

  Yeah, Stevie thought, you should probably pick up when the vice president of the United States calls.

  Rennie led Stevie, still in a state of semi-shock, through the newsroom to a conference room near the sports area.

  A large group, including Bobby, Tamara, and Susan Carol, had gathered. Some were seated, others were pouring coffee and grabbing Danish and bagels from a table in the front of the room.

  “Stevie!” Susan Carol called out, racing across the room to give him a hug and a quick kiss. She was dressed Sunday casual-blue jeans and a blouse with a sweater-but Stevie only noticed the boots that added to her height advantage. He almost said, “You had to wear the heels?” but wisely resisted.

  “How was your trip in?” he asked.

  “Easy,” she said. “We had breakfast at Krupin’s-you’d have loved it, a real New York deli.” Susan Carol knew that Stevie’s obsession-beyond sports-was food.

  Kelleher and Mearns came over to say hello, and introductions were made around the table once everyone sat down. The meeting was being run by Matt Vita, the Post’s sports editor, and Tom Goldman, the Herald’s sports editor. In all there were about twenty people in the room.

  “We want a good two weeks of stories in the run-up to the game,” Vita said. “Some will be predictable: history of the game, best Army-Navy games ever, rivalry stories, but I want everyone thinking about off-the-beaten-path stories. Camille and Kathy, we’re going to lean on you two for ideas since you know Navy so well and can probably offer insight on the Army side too.”

  Stevie had done some reading yesterday, so he knew that Camille Powell was the Post’s Navy beat writer and Kathy Orton covered the team for the Herald. He also knew that Navy had beaten Rutgers 31-7 on Saturday to raise its record to 8-2. They had one more game left before Army: next week at Notre Dame. Army had played a huge game too, winning at Air Force for-Stevie had gaped when he had read the stat in the paper-only the second time since 1977. The Cadets were also 8-2, with a home game left against Georgia Tech before they played Navy.

  Vita and Goldman went around the table doling out assignments and asking for suggestions. “Stevie, Susan Carol, you two are our wild cards,” Vita said when it was their turn. “Stevie, since you don’t live that far from West Point, we’re going to send you up there. You’ll go to the Georgia Tech game next week, and then we want you to spend as much time there after that as you can. Susan Carol, we’ll send you to South Bend for the Navy-Notre Dame game and then on to Annapolis afterward.

  “You’re just trying to find interesting story lines regardless of where you are. Susan Carol, since you’ll be with Navy, before you get started, get some guidance from Camille and Kathy.”

  Susan Carol nodded.

  “Oh, one more thing for you two,” Vita added. “On the Monday before the game, you’ll be going to the White House to interview President Obama.”

  “Really-why us?” Stevie couldn’t help asking.

  “We thought having the two of you do it might make it more interesting, get him a little off-message. Woodward set it up for us.”

  Wow, Stevie thought, an interview with the president. Now that should make for some interesting repording.

  The meeting lasted a couple hours, and then Stevie, Susan Carol, Kelleher, and Mearns went into Mearns’s office to talk more about story ideas. That done, they all went to get a late lunch before dropping Stevie at Union Station for his five o’clock train home again. Stevie’s only regret was that he didn’t get to spend any time alone with Susan Carol. And since she would be with Navy and he would be with Army, he wouldn’t even see her all that much before the game.

  When he brought it up, Kelleher smiled and said, “Are you in this to cover sports or to hang out with Susan Carol?”

  “Both,” Stevie answered.

  Mearns laughed. “You have to respect an honest man,” she said.

  Susan Carol said nothing. But the smile on her face told him he had answered Kelleher’s question correctly.

  4. ON THE POST

  The next few days dragged for Stevie. School was, quite simply, something he knew he had to do. The only subject that really excited him was history, and this week was more about English, math, and Spanish.

  But on Friday he got out of school early so he and Kelleher could drive up to West Point. The Army team would be getting ready to leave campus to spend the night before the game in a hotel.

  Kelleher, as usual, had done some advance planning. “They’ve started a tradition under Coach Ellerson of seeing the team off whenever they leave the Post,” Kelleher said. “We’ll be there in time for that. And Cantelupe and Noto will meet us. We’ll eat dinner in the mess hall so you can get a feel for how the cadets live, and then we’ll have to be up early for the game in the morning.”

  Stevie could fill in most of the blanks Kelleher had left in his explanation: Rich Ellerson was Army’s coach. It was only his second year there, but he had completely turned around a program that had endured twelve straight losing seasons. Jim Cantelupe and Anthony Noto were former Army football players Kelleher had come to know through the years. Cantelupe was some kind of investment banker who lived in Chicago. Noto was the chief financial officer for the NFL. The one thing Stevie didn’t understand was Kelleher’s reference to “the Post.”

  Kelleher laughed. “Sorry, it’s an Army thing,” he said. “The college is on an Army post. A lot more people live and work there than the four thousand cadets. So they call it the Post. At Navy, which is a lot smaller, the campus is called the Yard. There’s a lot of Army-Navy lingo-you’ll pick it up.”

  The drive north was pretty, and fortunately traffic was relatively light. By late afternoon, Stevie spotted a sign that said WEST POINT-2 MILES.

  They had to go through two security checkpoints to enter the Post.

  “That big building on our right is the Thayer Hotel, which is where we’re staying tonight,” Kelleher said as they drove up to the second checkpoint. “It’s named for Sylvanus Thayer, who founded the academy.”

  They drove up a hill and Stevie was amazed by the beauty of the place. It was a crisp fall day and the trees were all dec
ked out in reds and golds. Stevie could see the football stadium and water beyond that.

  “That’s the reservoir,” Kelleher said. “Beyond that is the Hudson River. We’ll take a tour tomorrow morning and you’ll be able to see it all. It’s pretty spectacular.”

  They took a right turn beyond the stadium, wound around, and Kelleher pulled into a parking lot. “It’s not a long walk from here,” he said. “We’ve got a few minutes since we didn’t hit much traffic.”

  They walked through the parking lot and across a street and came to a massive open area. “They call this the Plain,” Kelleher said. “It’s the central part of the campus. Those bleachers across the way are set up for the parade tomorrow morning.” He pointed at a statue. “Sylvanus Thayer,” he said.

  “Guess he’s kind of a star around here,” Stevie said.

  Kelleher laughed. “I’d say so. But there are lots of statues. In fact, the place we’re going has a giant statue of George Washington and we’ll also walk past one of Douglas MacArthur.”

  Stevie’s phone was buzzing in his pocket. He looked at the number and answered: it was Susan Carol.

  “Where are you?” she asked.

  “Walking by a bunch of generals,” Stevie said. “How about you?”

  “We’re on our way to have dinner with the Navy team at the hotel,” she said. “We were just at the stadium when the team did their walk-through. What an amazing place it is. Touchdown Jesus is even cooler in person than on TV. Pat Haden was really nice, and so was Tom Hammond, the announcers, you know, from NBC? I guess Tom and Tamara are old friends.”

  Her words were coming in a rush, her southern accent in full flight.

  “Where are you staying?” he said when she paused for breath.

  “Oh! That’s a funny story too,” she said. “We’re staying with the team in a place over the Indiana-Michigan state line in a town called Michiana.”