Hope to hopeless: CMU football's 2008 season will be remembered for faults
DETROIT - Seasons are always remembered more for how they ended than how they started.
CMU's 2008 season ended up no different.
An 8-2 start, win against a BCS Conference team and a perspective top 25 ranking all seem now far into the past.
This season instead will be remembered for three other memories: their three straight losses to Ball State, Eastern Michigan and their last game of the season, Friday's Motor City Bowl loss to Florida Atlantic.
The team's inability to finish out could have been CMU's most prolific win in history will now just be months of self questioning and what if's.
Friday's game was the team's opportunity to gain redemption for a regular season that ended in frustration. But the team's offense failed to find any flow and Florida Atlantic's offense capitalized when given opportunities.
There is no doubt the team can look at this past season and find positive moments. The win against rival Western Michigan and the road win at Indiana will give CMU something to hold onto looking back.
But with what opportunities CMU had, one will have to wonder if it will be enough. The Chippewas failed to three-peat as Mid-American Champions, lost in the Motor City Bowl and against Eastern Michigan for its second straight year and came up short in becoming the first team in school history to crack the top 25.
In CMU's favor looking into the offseason and on to next, the fact that the team will lose few starting players and return most of its core group: junior quarterback Dan LeFevour, junior wide receiver Bryan Anderson, sophomore Antonio Brown, sophomore Nick Bellore and many others all will be back.
Coach Butch Jones said he is going to reevaluate the entire program after Friday's loss.
Changes will no doubt have to be made, because the three losses at the end of the 2008 season will be remembered so much more than the eight the team won.
sports@cm-life.com
