BOWLING GREEN — Aug. 29 is the beginning of the great wide open for Bowling Green.
A program that won the Mid-American Conference as recently as 2015 is facing a down-to-the-studs restoration following three seasons during which the Falcons won only nine of its past 36 games.
Bowling Green tasked coach Scot Loeffler with turning the tides, and in year No. 1, the Falcons have no shortage of challenges. Turnover shortened BG’s ranks — nearly half the roster has freshman eligibility — and most of the current players have not experienced winning at the Division I level.
“When you come into a program that has been losing for the last three years, I mean, there’s not a lot of guys left here from when I first walked in,” said quarterback Grant Loy, a redshirt junior. “Not a lot of guys know what it’s like to win.”
But the Falcons see hope in a new philosophy and a new set of ideals.
“I want this to be a team full of energy, and since the new staff came in, that’s all it’s been,” defensive tackle DeMontae Haigler said. “It’s been very high energy and very enthused, and people have been really self-motivated to do their own thing and get better, to do their part and help the team.”
The team has only 75 scholarship players, 10 fewer than the maximum amount allowed by the NCAA, but everyone on the team is around for the same reason: They want to be around for what comes next.
“That’s what Coach Loeffler has done a great job of, just getting everybody to buy in,” Loy said. “Everybody is starting to see that, hey, if you buy in, we’re going to win some games, and we’re going to be successful here.”
Loeffler oversaw major changes to BG’s conditioning program, its practice standards, and continues to challenge the overall habits of a team trying to become a winner again.
Players who aren’t practicing to the coaches’ liking earn a yellow jersey to be worn until further notice. He implemented a Toledo Drill, during which the loudspeakers play the UT fight song, to emphasize the rivalry game BG has lost nine years in a row.
To be a competitive team again, Loeffler said BG has to shed its tendency to be what he called “a once-in-a-while organization.”
“That next step of consistency is the hardest thing that we’re going to go through,” Loeffler said. “As soon as we can get consistent effort and consistent play, success will occur. That next step that we’re fighting and scratching to overcome, it’s got to be a daily, daily emphasis to get over that hurdle.”
A week from the first game, BG does not know who will start at quarterback, and the roster has plenty of unanswered questions.
The Falcons expect true freshmen to play, and their schedule isn’t exactly favorable to a rebuilding team. Among their four nonconference games, the Falcons have two Power Five road games — at Kansas State and at Notre Dame — and a home game against a Louisiana Tech program coming off five straight winning seasons.
In conference, the Falcons play five of the projected top six teams from the MAC preseason poll.
As expected, Bowling Green isn’t drawing much attention going into the season.
“I think everybody’s counting us out,” Falcons safety Jerry McBride III said. “We went 3-9 last year. I mean, what would you expect? But we really have a chip on our shoulder.”
Bowling Green’s aim in 2019 is steady growth. Loeffler said last month he wants the Falcons to become the MAC’s most improved team, and said this week the mantra for the entire season is daily improvement.
Nearly everyone outside of the program is expecting Bowling Green to be a losing team again, which is more than fine with them.
The Falcons see in themselves something different this time, with the potential to surprise along the way.
“Nobody expects too much from us, and that’s OK,” Haigler said. “That’s why we come out here and play games.”
First Published August 21, 2019, 10:10 p.m.
