UMass rebuilt almost its entire roster after a 0-12 disaster. Bowling Green survived a coaching change and a portal exodus of its own. Neither team has anything to prove nationally, but somebody's going to feel a lot better about the offseason after this one.
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SAT NOV 28 · 11:00 AM CT
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Massachusetts
Bowling Green
This one closes out the 2026 regular season the same way 2025 did: Bowling Green and UMass, same building block of the MAC schedule, same low stakes on paper. The Falcons have won every single meeting in this series, and last year's edition wasn't close — a 45-14 beatdown in Amherst that put an exclamation point on a winless UMass season. Both programs spent the offseason trying to make sure that doesn't happen again, just from very different starting points.
UMass basically started over. Head coach Joe Harasymiak brought in roughly 27 transfers and signed 21 recruits in one of the program's best classes on record, and the headline addition is Virginia Tech transfer QB Pop Watson, who's penciled in as the starter after reportedly building chemistry with a new offensive coordinator this spring. RB Rocko Griffin, WR Donnie Gray and TE Max Dowling are still around to catch and carry the ball for him. It's a lot of new pieces asked to erase a 16-game losing streak in a hurry.
Bowling Green isn't exactly stable either. Eddie George's second season follows a 4-8 debut after Scot Loeffler bolted for the Eagles' staff, and the Falcons lost over 30 players to the portal this winter — bad enough that one BG outlet called the roster "ravaged and gutted." What George kept is mostly on defense: Eriq George, Dalyn White, Myles Bradley and Dorian Pringle, who's back from a torn ACL, give the front seven some actual continuity while the offense gets patched together again.
Massachusetts Minutemen
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Fully healthy — no injuries to report
Bowling Green Falcons
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Fully healthy — no injuries to report
Massachusetts Minutemen
Bowling Green Falcons
The series history is lopsided enough that it's worth remembering these two programs have produced some absurd offensive numbers when they've met — Bowling Green once put up 725 yards in this matchup. That's not who either team is right now, with both sides breaking in new quarterback rooms, but it's a reminder this game can get out of hand in either direction once someone's defense cracks.
Neither team is playing for a division title or a marquee bowl bid here — this reads like two rebuilding rosters trying to find out who they are by the time Week 14 rolls around. For UMass, it's about proving the portal spend and a new QB actually translate to wins. For Bowling Green, it's about not letting last year's 4-8 turn into something worse while the roster keeps churning.
