Liam Szarka finishing the game this past weekend tells you everything.
The Air Force junior ran for 81 yards and two touchdowns in Saturday's 14-9 win over Navy, a victory that snapped a five-game service academy losing streak.
But on Monday, the academy announced a lower-leg injury will cost Szarka the rest of the season.
Air Force hasn't said how or when the injury happened and "lower leg" covers a lot. A clean fracture can heal in six to eight weeks and ligament damage or surgery can push rehab to six months or longer. Coach Troy Calhoun's statement targets a 2027 return, so read between the lines.
A triple-option quarterback like that carries the ball like a tailback and gets hit like one, so it shouldn't be a huge surprise nowadays. At a 190 pounds, Szarka absorbed that punishment for a living. It's his second straight season cut short, after a broken arm at UConn last November.
Szarka's production is the easy part to measure. He currently leads the Mountain West in rushing (98 yards per game) and rushing touchdowns (seven). In 2025, he led the Falcons in rushing, passing and total offense. Calhoun called the loss tough to digest, pointing to Szarka's value as a leader as much as a player.
5' 10," 210 lb. sophomore Evan Medders is likely to start Saturday at Northern Illinois. Medders beat out senior Josh Johnson for the backup job in camp and has played in three of four games, running for 109 yards and a touchdown on 18 carries. Medder's built like a fullback with a quarterback's job, which seems a typical and maybe prototypical Szarka profile for this system this season.
Johnson also started four games in 2025. He and senior Kemper Hodges, a 245-pound former fullback, split the QB job in last year's finale after Szarka broke his arm.
We had Air Force No. 3 in the Mountain West and we're not tearing that up yet. The Falcons are 3-1 and their defense held Navy to 1 of 11 on third down. But Szarka was the guy who turned 2 yards into 12. Without him, the margin for error just got a whole lot thinner.
Calhoun has rebuilt on the fly before. In his 20th season, he'll have to do it again.
