After trailing for much of the game last October 29, Toledo took its first lead on Eastern Michigan on a one-yard pass from Tucker Gleason to Lenny Kuhl with 2:09 remaining. A late interception sealed the deal, and Toledo moved to 4-1 in conference play as EMU fell to 2-3.
That two-game advantage just barely held up. EMU won out, Toledo lost two of three, and the Rockets won their first MAC West title in five years on the head-to-head tiebreaker. EMU remained the only current conference member to never reach the MAC championship, and Toledo reigned as, frankly, it more frequently should. The Rockets have some of the best facilities in the MAC and pull in the best recruiting rankings on average. That they’ve only played in the conference title game twice since 2004 is pretty baffling. Regardless, they got there, and they won, beating Ohio by 10.
In theory, they should win again in 2023, and EMU should once again be their primary challenger. But “should” doesn’t tend to play in the MAC. This is a conference of parity, funky bounces and beautiful, beautiful nonsense, and lots of teams are plotting bounceback campaigns as we speak.
Let’s preview the MAC West!
Every week through the offseason, Bill Connelly will preview another division from the Group of 5 and Power 5 exclusively for ESPN+, ultimately including all 133 FBS teams. The previews will include 2022 breakdowns, 2023 previews and burning questions for each team.
Earlier previews: Conference USA, part 1 | Conference USA, part 2 | MAC East
2022 recap
A close win may have made the difference for Toledo, but three close losses nearly wrecked everything. In the end, five of six teams finished within two games of the top of the West, and the only team that didn’t (NIU) was the defending champ. Makes perfect sense, right? You are particularly beholden to the whims of the injury bug and the god of close games in this conference, and NIU ran afoul of both, falling from 9-5 to 3-9. Western Michigan and Central Michigan also stumbled from a combined 17-9 in 2021 to 9-15, and in the end only Toledo and EMU finished bowl eligible. It makes sense, then, that they start 2023 on top of the pile.
2023 projections
This year’s initial returning production rankings were pretty well-dispersed in the West. Toledo and NIU were in the top 15, while WMU, the only West team to change coaches, ranked 121st, ahead of only last-place Kent State within the MAC. But that tells you pretty clearly why the Rockets start out nearly a touchdown ahead of everyone else while the Broncos bring up the rear.
Burning questions
Is this where it finally all comes together for Jason Candle’s Toledo? I realize that’s a strange thing to ask about a coach who has won at least nine games three times and boasts a pair of MAC titles. From a 50,000-foot view, Toledo has been the MAC model under Candle. He’s never finished with a losing record, he recruits well, and when an adjustment is required, he makes it. When Toledo’s defense needed an upgrade after falling to 118th in defensive SP+ in 2019, Candle brought in Mount Union head coach Vince Kehres as coordinator, and he’s been a resounding success: The Rockets leaped to 35th and 54th, respectively, the last two years. The defense allowed them to take the West title last season despite a late-year injury to quarterback Dequan Finn.
Candle’s done well, but as I wrote about Miami’s Chuck Martin in last week’s East preview, it’s hard not to feel like he’s left some wins on the table, too. He inherited a robust program from Iowa State-bound Matt Campbell in 2016 and went 20-7 in his first two years, but even with last year’s nine-win campaign he’s just 33-25 since, dragged down by a 9-14 record in one-score finishes. Four of last year’s five losses came by seven or fewer points, and it almost derailed what should have been about an 11-win season or so.
Toledo’s ceiling should be even higher than normal in 2023. Finn and Gleason, a solid backup, have both returned (at least for now), as have all five players with at least 70 intended touches last season — backs Jacquez Stuart, Micah Kelly and Peny Boone and receivers Jerjuan Newton and Devin Maddox. The line returns three starters, including all-conference contenders in guard Vinny Sciury and tackle Nick Rosi, and welcomes back an injured 2021 starter in guard Tyler Long.
When healthy, Finn is tantalizing. He had a top-40 Total QBR rating halfway through the season, he rushed for at least 60 yards in seven games, and despite Toledo’s run-heavy tendencies he threw for at least 240 yards in four. His performance against Kent State — 263 passing yards and six TDs, plus 87 rushing yards and another score — was one of the best single-game QB performances of the year. He can scramble into trouble at times, and he takes too many hits. But if he’s got two healthy legs, he’s one of the most enjoyable players in the MAC.
On defense, there are a few key pieces to replace in the front seven, but edge rusher Adrian Woliver is good, and the Toledo secondary might be the best in the entire Group of Five. The Rockets allowed the third-lowest passing success rate in FBS, and corners Quinyon Mitchell and Chris McDonald combined for six interceptions, 27 breakups and, for good measure, five tackles for loss as well.
Better yet, because they’re starting out so far ahead of the West pack, SP+ only projects two Toledo games within one score at the moment — at Miami (Ohio) on October 21 and at Central Michigan on November 24. You can’t lose close games if there aren’t any!
This feels like a coronation year, but I’ve been writing these previews long enough to know that we tend to predict more division titles for Toledo than Toledo tends to win. The Rockets’ offense hasn’t ranked better than 75th in offensive SP+ since 2018, and for as good as the defense could be, it was a sieve in the red zone. I’d love to see what a fifth-gear Toledo looks like, but something tends to hold them back. Will that be the case once again in 2023?
Is this where EMU’s title drought ends? If Toledo indeed stumbles, it feels like EMU is the most likely beneficiary. Lord knows Chris Creighton deserves a ring for the job he’s done in Ypsilanti. When he came aboard in 2014, EMU was in the middle of a nearly 30-year bowl drought. The Eagles had won more than four games in a season just once since 1995, and the one time they had done so — they went 6-6 in 2011, albeit with a pair of FCS wins — they proceeded to lose 20 of their next 24.
Historically, this has been one of the hardest jobs in FBS, but Creighton, a conference title winner at NAIA’s Ottawa, Division III’s Wabash and FCS’ Drake, had the Eagles bowling by year three. He’s produced good offenses (49th in offensive SP+ in 2020) and good defenses (back-to-back top 50s in 2017-18), and his Eagles have had one of the more reliably awesome special teams units in college football for the last three years. They’ve beaten Rutgers, Purdue, Illinois and, in 2022, Arizona State.
The job remains hard — after jumping to 7-6 in 2016, EMU went just 27-30 over the next five seasons. But the Eagles remain competitive in a competitive conference, and they broke another barrier in 2022. They won nine games for just the second time in 48 years as an FBS team, and in their fifth try under Creighton they finally won a bowl game, manhandling San Jose State in the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl. They now have two all-time bowl wins, both, somehow, against SJSU.
To be sure, they benefited from the fact that most of the rest of the West — NIU, CMU, WMU and Ball State — took backward steps in 2022. And unlike Toledo, they must replace their starting quarterback (Taylor Powell), plus three-fifths of an excellent offensive line. The defense brings back 11 of the 15 players with 250-plus snaps last season and could benefit from the fact that last year’s aggressive, young secondary is now aggressive and experienced. (If not for Toledo’s Quinyon Mitchell, I’d be building up corner Kempton Shine as maybe the best in the MAC.) But an ultra-efficient offense was the primary reason for last year’s breakthrough, and players like quarterback Austin Smith, wideout Tanner Knue and burly running back Samson Evans will have to raise their respective games to keep EMU in the West’s top two.
Where did CMU’s offense go? Jim McElwain’s time in Mount Pleasant was an immediate success. CMU had suddenly collapsed to 1-11 in 2018, but McElwain, the former Florida head coach, had immediately flipped the Chippewas to 8-6 in 2019, then pushed them to 9-4 in 2021. The defense was decent, and the offense, piloted by young stars like quarterback Daniell Richardson (2,633 passing yards in 2021) and running back Lew Nichols III (1,848 rushing yards) was an absolute blast.
In 2022, Richardson fell from 63rd to 106th in Total QBR. Nichols battled injuries and went from averaging 5.4 yards per carry to 3.5. The offensive line committed too many penalties, receivers dropped too many passes, and after averaging 30.8 points per game in non-conference play (which featured competitive losses to Oklahoma State and Penn State), CMU failed to hit even 20 points in any of five MAC losses. Despite a solid core of experience, they fell from 57th to 102nd in offensive SP+ and from 9-4 to 4-8. Richardson transferred to FAU, Nichols went pro, and for the second straight year CMU lost its top two pass catchers.
It felt like things fell apart for the Chips last year. But we might have caught a glimpse of a bright future in November. His name is Bert.
BERT EMANUEL JR. 🚨
He somehow stays up and takes it 87 yards to tie the game! pic.twitter.com/H29PtSvZN4
— ESPN College Football (@ESPNCFB) November 10, 2022
Bert Emanuel Jr. is FLYING through the elements 🏂❄️ pic.twitter.com/dHw1vAwizV
— ESPN College Football (@ESPNCFB) November 17, 2022
The son of the Bert Emanuel Rule’s namesake, Bert Emanuel Jr. saw time at QB late in his true freshman season and dazzled. He earned national player of the week honors by rushing for 293 yards in an upset of Buffalo, then he rushed for 173 more against WMU and EMU. Granted, he went just 4-for-8 passing — another freshman, Jase Bauer, did most of the throwing during this period (and managed to throw five picks in 59 passes) — but Emanuel’s potential was obvious from nearly his first snap. We’ll see how he handles expectations.
If the offense rebounds to some degree, the defense should hold up its end of the bargain. Coordinator Robb Akey fielded an extremely young lineup last year: Among 18 players with 150-plus snaps were 11 freshmen and sophomores, and some of the youngsters, like end Michael Heldman (5.5 TFLs), linebackers Kyle Moretti and Justin Whiteside (14 combined TFLs and 27 run stops), safety Trey Jones (12 run stops and two INTs) and corner Donte Kent (14 breakups), produced. Akey’s best defense was the 2021 unit that ranked 75th in defensive SP+, and it wouldn’t surprise me if CMU topped that this year. But the offense must show infinitely more consistency. And that will probably require Emanuel to complete more than one pass per game.
What does normal look like at NIU? In the last three seasons for Thomas Hammock at NIU, it’s all gone wrong, then all right, then all wrong again. Hammock’s Huskies have been on a nonstop roller coaster, going 0-6 in 2020, surging to 9-5 and a West title in 2021, then crumbling back to 3-9.
NIU was the most physical team in the MAC during 2021’s title run and the most injured in 2022. Quarterback Rocky Lombardi and slot man extraordinaire Trayvon Rudolph both missed most or all of last season, and the offense didn’t boast a single player who started all 12 games; that the Huskies fell only from 40th to 67th in offensive SP+ was a minor miracle.
The slippage did, however, expose a defense that was flawed in 2021 and downright bad in 2022. NIU ranked 128th in defensive SP+ and allowed 37.2 points per game in losses. It would have been difficult for even a healthy offense to keep up with that. Inexperience was certainly an issue, as evidenced by the fact that, of the 17 returning defenders who saw at least 100 snaps in 2022, only two (tackles James Ester and Demond Taylor) are now seniors. There were freshmen and sophomores everywhere you looked, and that’s at least one issue coordinator Nick Benedetto won’t have to deal with in 2023.
With Lombardi, Rudolph, running back Antario Brown and last year’s top six linemen (including all-conference tackle Nolan Potter) all returning, it sure seems like it could be 2021 all over again on offense. Lombardi began his career at Michigan State in 2017, and after last year’s medical redshirt, he’ll spend his seventh and final collegiate season back in DeKalb. He threw for 2,597 yards and averaged 5.9 yards per non-sack carry in 2021, and if he remains on the field, NIU could have another top-50 offense.
NIU has prime rebound potential, in other words. The roller coaster ride might continue with another upward surge, even if SP+, baffled by the last few seasons, isn’t so sure.
Who bounces back first, Ball State or WMU? The MAC’s Covid-altered 2020 season was a short-term sprint, and no one in the West pulled it off better than Ball State and WMU. They went a combined 11-3, with BSU’s 30-27 win in Muncie making the difference in the division race. Mike Neu’s Cardinals upset Buffalo to win the MAC, then blew out SJSU in the Arizona Bowl. It was a deserved surge for Neu, whose team had been beset by injuries and tight losses in previous seasons. It was also a continuation for WMU’s Tim Lester, who had taken the reins from P.J. Fleck in 2017 and kept the Broncos above water.
From 11-3, BSU and WMU dipped to 14-12 in 2021, then 10-14 with matching five-win seasons last fall. Instead of a surge, 2020 was a peak for Neu, and after finishing below .500 for the first time, Lester was let go by his alma mater in December.
If you’ve read this far — or simply watched MAC ball for any sustained period of time — you have probably come to understand that fortunes can shift in a heartbeat here. Momentum is difficult to maintain. Neu fixed one issue at BSU (after ranking 123rd in defensive SP+ in 2019, the Cardinals have averaged a respectable 81.3 ranking since) but hasn’t been able to stop another one from forming. They peaked at 38th in offensive SP+ in 2020 but plummeted to 114th last year.
After scoring 30 or more in three of their first five games, the Cardinals averaged just 20.1 points per game from there, lost four of their last five, then lost quarterback John Paddock (to Illinois), 1,500-yard rusher Carson Steele (to UCLA) and last year’s top two targets (Jayshon Jackson and Yo’Heinz Tyler). Neu tried to counter portal losses with portal gains, bringing in quick-passing former Arkansas State and Texas State quarterback Layne Hatcher and Kent State’s 1,300-yard rusher Marquez Cooper.
Combine the newbies with a line that boasts a trio of potential all-conference juniors (led by left tackle Corey Stewart) and a couple of potential matchup nightmares in sophomore tight ends Tanner Koziol (6-foot-7) and Brady Hunt (6-foot-6), and if the Cardinals get anything from a rebuilt receiving corps, the offense should improve. It will need to because while the front seven returns virtually everyone and boasts one of the conference’s best linebacking corps, the secondary returns only two of last year’s top eight and might start as many as three transfers.
Up the road in Kalamazoo, new head man Lance Taylor might need some time. Defensive coordinator Lou Esposito definitely will. A holdover from Lester’s staff, Esposito handed at least 250 snaps to 12 players last season, and nine are gone. The Broncos jumped from 95th to 65th in defensive SP+ but might head right back down the list. That will put pressure on an offense that absolutely vanished: The Broncos were 13th in offensive SP+ in 2020, 37th in 2021 … and 127th in 2022. Four different QBs attempted passes last year, and none of them did it well. Jack Salopek “led” the way with 1,285 yards, seven TDs and 11 picks.
Taylor, most recently Louisville’s offensive coordinator, and former Richmond and VMI play-caller Billy Cosh will spend the spring establishing some sort of pecking order among flawed QB contenders and will spend the fall hoping an experienced offensive line can paper over quite a few cracks in both the QB room and on an unproven skill corps.
My 10 favorite players
We’ll refrain from listing Bert Emanuel Jr. here because the 2022 sample size was so small. But it’s easy to be excited about his potential.
QB Dequan Finn, Toledo. Even with last season’s late-year injuries and funk baked in, Finn’s stats — 2,260 passing yards (47% success rate) and 764 non-sack rushing yards (6.9 per carry) — are enticing. His scrambling had Ohio State’s defense in hell for a bit last September.
RB Antario Brown, NIU. NIU lost its leading rusher to the portal for the second straight year, but while they’ll miss Harrison Waylee, more touches for the burly but explosive Brown (218 pounds, 6.3 yards per carry, 7.3 outside the tackles) might not be the worst thing in the world.
WR Trayvon Rudolph, NIU. In a three-game span midway through NIU’s MAC title run in 2021, Rudolph caught 28 balls for 577 yards and five touchdowns. His upside is immense, and he was sorely missed after suffering a knee injury in fall camp.
LG Deiyantei Powell-Woods, CMU. The 300-pounder from Bluefield, W.V., was instrumental when Lew Nichols III led the nation in rushing in 2021, produced a 0.9% blown block rate in 2022 and will be key to whatever becomes of Emanuel in 2023.
RT Brian Dooley, EMU. The Eagles have three strong linemen to replace, but at least they still have the 6-foot-7, 302-pound senior tackle, who allowed just two sacks on his way to second-team all-conference honors last year.
DE Marshawn Kneeland, WMU. Lou Esposito’s defense will have new faces everywhere you look, but he’s got a constant in Kneeland. The 275-pounder led the team with 18 run stops in only nine games and broke up three passes for good measure, and after committing to transfer to Colorado in December, it appears he’s back on the WMU roster this spring.
LB Cole Pearce, Ball State. Pearce and fellow LBs Clayton Coll and Sidney Houston Jr. combined for 273 tackles, 28 TFLs, 29 run stops, 11 sacks and eight passes defensed last season, and all three return. They could make life much easier for a remodeled secondary.
CB Quinyon Mitchell, Toledo. Granted, four of his picks came in one game (a quadruple-pick, double-touchdown performance against NIU), but Mitchell’s 2022 numbers were unreal: five INTs, 17 breakups, four tackles for loss, four run stops and a QBR of 5.7 allowed in coverage. 5.7! The lowest QBR you can have is 0.0!
CB Kempton Shine, EMU. This division is loaded with high-upside corners, and Shine is among the best. He picked off one pass, broke up nine more and allowed a paltry 14.8 QBR as primary coverage guy in 2022.
S Trey Jones, CMU. The Chippewas defense lost its top three safeties from 2021 but somehow improved overall, thanks in part to the work of Jones, who picked off a pair of passes and played much bigger than his 200 pounds suggest, recording 12 run stops and 6.5 TFLs.
Anniversaries
In 1968, 55 years ago, Toledo lost for the last time in four years. On November 16, a Dayton Flyers team coached by John McVay — future San Francisco 49ers GM and grandfather of Super Bowl winner Sean McVay — outlasted Frank Lauterbur’s Rockets, 10-3, on a muddy track. On September 9, 1972, the Rockets fell 21-0 to Earle Bruce’s Tampa Spartans, who were on their way to a program-best 10-2 season.
In between these losses, Toledo went 35-0. They won three straight MAC titles and three straight Tangerine Bowls, and they finished 12th in the AP poll in 1970 and 14th in 1971. Led by All-Americans like cornerback Curtis Johnson and Hall of Fame defensive tackle Mel Long, the Rockets dominated defensively and scored more than enough on offense. They set the bar ridiculously high for all future MAC champs, and it’s possible that no one has cleared that bar since.
In 1983, 40 years ago, Jim Harkema took over at EMU. After a decade of success at Grand Valley State, Harkema took on a program that had gone just 7-44-2 over its previous five seasons. After seven wins in three years, Harkema led EMU to a 6-5 record in 1986, then peaked with a 10-2 run and California Bowl victory — their only bowl win until 2022 — in 1987. He is the only EMU coach who’s won more games than Chris Creighton during EMU’s FBS tenure.
In 2003, 20 years ago, NIU reached 12th in the polls. Joe Novak’s time at NIU was the ultimate lesson in patience. His Huskies won just three games in his first three seasons, then won 17 in the next three. They broke through to 8-4 in 2002, and in 2003, led by quarterback Josh Haldi and a 1,000-yard receiver by the name of P.J. Fleck, they rose even higher. Early-season wins over No. 15 Maryland (20-13) and No. 21 Alabama (19-16) earned them a No. 20 poll ranking, and by late October they were 7-0 and up to 12th. They were upended by Josh Harris and No. 23 Bowling Green but rallied to win three of four and finish with double-digit wins for the first time in 20 years.
In 2008, 15 years ago, Ball State started 12-0. Five years after NIU did it, Ball State also reached 12th in the polls and threatened to do even more than that. Brady Hoke’s Cardinals walloped Indiana on the way to a 12-0 start that featured 10 wins by more than two touchdowns. Nate Davis threw for 3,591 yards, Miquale Lewis rushed for 1,736, and Davyd Jones racked up 12 TFLs. This was a dominant team … that didn’t stick the landing. They committed five turnovers in an upset loss to Buffalo in the MAC Championship, lost Hoke to San Diego State and got pummeled by Tulsa in the GMAC Bowl. But hey, those first 12 games were awesome.
In 2013, 10 years ago, CMU produced the No. 1 pick in the NFL draft. Dan Enos succeeded Butch Jones as CMU’s head coach in 2010, and his five years there were … fine. He left after going 26-36 and guiding the Chips to bowl eligibility three times. But his tenure will be forever remembered for two things. First, CMU pulled off one of the greatest plays in bowl history, a Hail Mary hook-and-ladder in the 2014 Bahamas Bowl.
(Don’t ask me about the dreadful fade call on the two-point conversion attempt that followed. I’m still not ready to talk about it.)
Second, the school developed the 6-foot-7 Eric Fisher from a two-star recruit into a 2012 All-American, a No. 1 pick and a two-time Pro Bowler. There are worse legacies.
Also in 2013, PJ Fleck’s WMU went 1-11. The former NIU and San Francisco 49ers receiver had no coordinator experience when he took the reins at WMU in 2013, but the world quickly learned why he got the job: He could recruit. He stripped the proverbial house down to the studs and struggled early, but he quickly filled the two-deep with some of the best recruiting classes the MAC has seen.
The Broncos went 8-5 in 2014 and 2015, then leaped to 13-1 with the school’s first Cotton Bowl appearance and top-15 finish in 2016. Fleck left for Minnesota but set an awfully high that Tim Lester couldn’t quite clear. Lester went 37-32 at his alma mater but was let go after a single sub-.500 season. We’ll see if that move ends up astute or simply impatient.