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Sunshine, daisies and the sweet sound of pads popping in the morning. For those of us battling through college football withdrawals springtime marks the beginning to the alleviation of our wintertime-blues. It's a new beginning. A chance for teams to get back to building off a fantastic run, or start rebuilding after another botched season (we're looking at you UMass).
For several MAC schools this spring marks the beginning of a new chapter. Bowling Green, Eastern Michigan, Miami and UMass all welcome new coaches, and spring practice represents the "meet the friends" stage of their relationships with the fan bases. It's a chance to see how the coaches schemes and system works with the players and coaches leftover from the old regime. It's a chance for fans to get to see if they're beloved team's new beau is a lovely young chap, or if they need to be worried about his domineering tendencies.
It's also our first chance at moving on from the legacies of several great MAC players. Gone are the Jordan Lynches & Khalil Mack's. A whole new crop of talent must step up and fill the voids left by several of the MAC's best players who've gone on to greener (dolla dolla bill y'all) pastures. This is where it all begins.
Using our super-sleuthing skill we've dug up the official spring camp start dates and Spring Game dates for most (CMU is keeping this information under lock & key apparently) of the MAC. The majority of the teams are starting in mid-March and wrapping up in mid-April. Bowling Green's Dino Babers apparently wanted to show the world he really is all about speed though as his team began practices LAST WEEK.
Here's the start (and end) dates for the various spring camps around the MAC this year.
TEAM | FIRST SPRING PRACTICE | SPRING GAME (OR FINAL PRACTICE) |
Akron | March 17 | April 19 |
Ball State | March 25 | April 19 |
Bowling Green | Feb 27 | April 5 |
Buffalo | March 26 | April 19 |
Central Michigan | TBA | TBA |
Eastern Michigan | March 11 | April 12 |
Kent State | April 1 | April 26 |
UMass | March 9 | April 16 |
Miami | March 31 | May 3 |
Northern Illinois | March 18 | April 19 |
Ohio | March 10 | April 12 |
Toledo | March 12 | April 12 |
Western Michigan | March 18 | April 19 |
If you want to know specific start times of individual practices, or if said practices are even open to the public, you'll want to get ahold of the school's athletic departments.