Akron Zips Football - MAC champs?!

The Akron Zips could be Mid-American Conference champions.

It seems inconceivable. About a week ago, they seemed dead and buried. Then, with some luck and a lot of help, the Zips found themselves in Detroit tonight playing Northern Illinois, the MAC West champs.

If the team wins, it would be the first MAC championship for the football program. This would be a huge step not only for the football team, but for the University of Akron itself.

The school has already captured two MAC titles this fall, as the men's soccer team, who is currently in the elite eight of the NCAA championships, and the women's cross country team have both already won.

But they have won titles in the past. Football has never even been to the championship game, until tonight. So this is a stepping stone in itself, because a school’s football team is sometimes a barometer of how successful the team is in sports. A loss tonight can almost wipe out everything they’ve done, since they are 6-5, as they were last season.

And that was team that had Charlie Frye, Domenik Hixon, and not much else. This team is more of a team, so to disprove record-wise from a year ago would be a definite set back.

This is because six wins makes a Division I-A team bowl eligible. But if the Zips lose tonight, they will be 6-6, and NCAA rules state a team must be above .500 to be bowl eligible. So the Zips must win tonight to keep their eligibility. NIU has the advantage of making a bowl game even with a loss.

The Zips do have a couple of things going for them. Akron beat NIU 48-42 in overtime earlier in the season. Though the Zips blew a 42-21 lead in the fourth quarter, so that game might not be a good barometer to judge tonight's game on.

NIU is also without starting quarterback Phil Horvath, who torched the Zips secondary for 483 yards and six touchdowns in that Sept. 24 game. His backup, Dan Nicholson, has filled in nicely though, completing 67% of his passes this season, with five touchdowns and only two interceptions in seven games. So not having their starting quarterback might not be a problem for the Huskies.

Can the Zips win? Sure, they could. It's not like NIU is undefeated or anything. But this is the Zips. They have this tendency to underachieve. Examples of this would be the game against Ball State earlier this season, where the Zips spotted the Cardinals a 16-3 lead in the first half and could not recover in time, losing 24-17 when they where stopped at the goal line to finish the game. The Cardinals finished 4-7, and 4-4 in the MAC, which is not bad, but the game was certainly one that nearly cost the Zips a chance to play tonight.

My guess is that Akron will take an early lead, and the defense, which has been eye sore for years at Akron, will do what it does best - give up the lead. The game will be high scoring, but the Zips are going to come up short. My prediction is 41-38 NIU.

I could be wrong. Being an Akron Zip athlete myself, I hope I'm wrong. But the Zips haven't been here before, and getting over two humps in one season is asking for a lot.

But this still can be seen as a step in the right direction. Head Coach J.D. Brookhart has shown he knows what he is doing. Let's just hope he can have another good recruiting class this off-season to continue to steer this team in the right direction - the direction of respect.