They own a combined season record of 7-14, field no hot NFL prospects and boast a total of two bowl appearances since 1988.

Yet, when Army and Navy meet for the 100th time Saturday afternoon in Philadelphia, the appropriately named Veterans Stadium will be filled, CBS will earn one of its highest ratings for a college football game this fall and, history tells us, much of America will care at least a little.

"The success of this game is a mystery to me," said Bob Thompson, founder of the Center for the Study of Popular Television at Syracuse University. "In a country that cares less and less about the Army and Navy, it's surprising how this game seems to be gaining in popularity. The only explanation I can put to it is it has been really well packaged."

Well packaged on the tube, well positioned on the schedule, generally well played on the field and always well stocked with compelling stories. In arguably the nation's most enthralling and equitable rivalry, Army holds a 48-44-7 series lead. That's how close the programs are.

But the game features much more than competitiveness in drawing attention from around the country and the world, via the Armed Forces Network.

Author John Feinstein wrote an entire book on the series, called "A Civil War." He says the players themselves are the draw:

"I just think it comes down to who the kids are, what they represent at their best and the fact that most people who care about the game understand on some level what they go through just to be able to play in the game. ... It's college football's purist rivalry."

Cmdr. David Ruedi at Naval Support Activity-Mid South in Millington, Tenn., is a 1984 Naval Academy graduate who experienced the thrill of the game from the stands: "This game is different from other college games because it's not just drawing students of the college together; people who haven't attended either school still have a strong tie. You feel a sense of ownership over the team even if you didn't graduate from the academy."

Added Lt. Col. Cliff Yu, an army doctor who did not attend West Point, "There's nothing like it in sports. It's like a homecoming for a lot of us. You see people you've been stationed with over the years."

Like anything else in sports, television plays its part. CBS is so committed that in 1998 it negotiated an extension of its contract with the academies to last through 2008. The game is played the weekend after all other regular-season games around the nation in order to maximize exposure.

Ratings reflect the commitment. The game drew a 3.7 rating last year, making it the second-highest afternoon game on CBS during the regular season. The average CBS game this season, according to Karen Mateo of the network, earned a 3.1 rating.

Media interest extends beyond TV. Around 200 press credentials have been issued for this week's game, more than double the normal amount for an Army home game. Army is designated the home team this week.

"There are a lot of things you can say, but it is unique," said Mike Aresco, vice president for programming at CBS sports. "And it still has an appeal in this day and age. Who would have thought 10 or 15 years ago that Nebraska and Oklahoma would not play each other every year? You wouldn't have believed it. So, the Army-Navy game remains probably the best rivalry in sports.

"It has great tradition. People know the kids will give obviously maximum effort, and they are proud of the kids. They see true student-athletes. They see kids going into the armed forces to defend their country."

CBS treats this game differently from others in the regular season. The broadcast window is expanded from 3 to 3½ hours with even more time available if needed so the network can show the cadets and midshipmen marching into the stadium before the game and then show the two teams standing next to each other afterwards while the respective alma maters are sung.

The players are often overcome by emotion during the songs because for all but the rare senior like a Napoleon McCallum, who eventually went to the NFL, this is the last game they will ever play.

"I would maintain that the moments after the game where the players have tried to kill each other for three hours and then they stand at attention together for the playing of the alma maters are the absolute best five minutes of sports in the year," said Feinstein. "If you are in the stadium and see that and understand what they have given and you don't get chills then you aren't breathing."

Said Aresco, "It's a poignant moment."

Such theatre is one reason the game does so well at the gate. It routinely plays to packed houses, but its success is not limited to Philadelphia and the Meadowlands, the two regular sites. In 1983, the game went to the West for the first time, drawing 81,347 to the Rose Bowl. And both teams were 2-8 before Navy won, 42-13.

That was a rare blowout in this series. Six of the last seven games have been decided by four points or fewer. For the 99 games, Navy has scored 172 touchdowns to Army's 169 while averaging 13.4 points to the Cadets' 12.5.

The game has retained its presence through the protests of the Vietnam era as well as the calm of peacetime when the military isn't on people's minds. Syracuse professor Thompson marvels that as "the World War II generation winds down, it's kind of surprising that this thing carries some mythic weight."

Feinstein counters that a "lot of the 'who-cares' feeling about the military has swung around and that at the very least you have to respect those who volunteer" for the armed forces.

That "mythic weight" remains at least in part because of the names associated with this game, not just those of gridiron stars like Roger Staubach of Navy and Doc Blanchard and Glenn Davis of Army, but of players who received their acclaim after graduation, like Admiral William F. "Bull" Halsey and former CIA director Stansfield Turner of Navy and President Dwight D. Eisenhower and Gen. Omar Bradley of Army.

The myth is perpetuated by the current athletes who speak of this game reverently and give testament to its purity. When asked recently about the news that new NFL stadiums in Baltimore and Washington would like to host future Army-Navy games, Navy co-captain Jamie Doffermyre replied, "We could play on a parking lot. To tell you the truth, it just wouldn't matter."