Central Michigan University Chippewas Football

From a teachers' college to the MAC's largest bowl

Central Michigan has fielded a football team since 1896, which makes the programme older than most of what surrounds it in Mount Pleasant. Its competitive home moved repeatedly: independent until 1926, then the Michigan Collegiate Conference, then independent again, then nineteen years in the Interstate Intercollegiate Athletic Conference from 1950, where it collected nine league titles. The Chippewas joined the Mid-American Conference in 1975 and have stayed. The all-time record stands at 658–464–36.

The high point of the pre-MAC era came in 1974, when Roy Kramer's team went 12–1 and won the NCAA Division II national championship, beating Delaware 54–14 in the final. Kramer left for administration and later ran the Southeastern Conference; the field at Central Michigan's stadium now carries his name alongside that of Herb Deromedi, the College Football Hall of Fame inductee who became the MAC's winningest coach. Kelly/Shorts Stadium opened in 1972 and seats 35,127, the largest on-campus ground in the conference — a number that matters to how a Saturday there feels, because the programme rarely fills it.

Seven conference titles, four bowl wins

The MAC record is the programme's real body of work: championships in 1979, 1980, 1990, 1994, 2006, 2007 and 2009. The late-2000s run was the densest stretch, three titles in four years, and it doubled as a coaching conveyor belt — Brian Kelly and Butch Jones both took the job in Mount Pleasant and both left it for larger programmes.

Against that, the postseason ledger is unflattering: 4–10 in bowls. The wins that stand up are the 2012 Little Caesars Pizza Bowl, 24–21 over Western Kentucky, and the 2021 Sun Bowl, 24–21 against Washington State. The NFL pipeline has been more reliable than the January results. Antonio Brown, a seven-time Pro Bowl receiver, came through here, as did Joe Staley, a six-time Pro Bowl offensive tackle, Eric Fisher, the first overall pick of the 2013 draft, and Sean Murphy-Bunting, a Super Bowl LV winner.

The two rivalries that organise the calendar are both in-state. Western Michigan leads the series 53–40–2 as of November 2025. Eastern Michigan does not: Central Michigan leads that one 65–32–6, and the fixture is played at Ford Field in Detroit.

A new coach and a slogan about the unglamorous parts

Matt Drinkall was hired on 9 December 2024. His route was unusual for an FBS job. He went 42–17 as head coach at NAIA Kansas Wesleyan from 2014 to 2018, winning a conference title in 2018 and reaching the NAIA playoffs, then spent 2019 to 2024 on the Army staff, working up from quality control to tight ends and then the offensive line.

His first season produced 7–6 overall and 5–3 in the MAC, fifth in the conference and the programme's first winning year since 2021. Wins over San Jose State (16–14), Eastern Michigan (24–13), Bowling Green (27–6), UMass (38–13), Buffalo (38–19), Kent State (28–16) and Wagner (49–10) were offset by heavy losses at Pittsburgh and at Michigan, a three-point defeat at Western Michigan and a flat home loss to Toledo. The season ended at Ford Field on 26 December 2025, beaten 7–34 by Northwestern in the GameAbove Sports Bowl.

The 2026 team was always going to look different. Eight of eleven defensive starters left, along with quarterback Joe Labas and running backs Nahree Biggins and Trey Cornist. Drinkall's answer was a motto, "Own The Ugly", and a refusal to name a single quarterback — six were listed as candidates in pre-season, with Angel Flores and Jadyn Glasser, returning from injury, the two in front. Brock Townsend returned as the primary back; Korver Demma, Quavion Bird and Jaion Jackson held the defence together.

Where the season actually stands

The record through five games is 3–2, 1–0 in the MAC as of 9 October 2026, and the shape of it is stark. The opener at New Mexico on 5 September was a 7–38 defeat. A 13–10 home win over FCS Colgate on 12 September was followed by a more convincing 24–10 result against Wyoming on 19 September. Then came the trip to sixth-ranked Miami on 26 September, a 3–52 loss in front of 65,338 — more than three times any crowd Central Michigan has drawn at home this year.

The Homecoming game on 3 October was the first evidence that the rebuilt roster can impose itself. Central Michigan beat Akron 41–17 after trailing 7–0, scoring 21 unanswered points in the second quarter. Flores ran for 154 yards, tying the game with a 55-yard touchdown run and then throwing 48 yards to Shawn Foster II for the lead; Townsend scored from five yards with 18 seconds left in the half. Nick Woodford added a 27-yard run, Jayden Clerveaux a 23-yard run for his first career touchdown, and Glasser came on to find Langston Lewis for 71 yards in the fourth quarter. The team finished with 332 rushing yards and four rushing touchdowns, and intercepted Akron three times.

The next test is the hardest of the middle third: Ohio at Peden Stadium, scheduled for 3:30 p.m. EDT on ESPN+, against a Bobcats side also 3–2 and 1–0 in the MAC and carrying a 15-game home winning streak.

The name on the helmet

Central Michigan adopted "Chippewas" in 1942, and unlike most programmes with Native American names it still uses it — with the consent of the neighbouring Saginaw Chippewa Indian Tribe of Michigan, formalised in a 2002 agreement under which both sides committed to removing offensive imagery. When the NCAA placed the university on its list of "hostile or abusive" nicknames in August 2005, the tribe backed the appeal, and on 2 September 2005 the university announced it had been upheld.

That arrangement has live obligations, and they surfaced again on 3 October 2026, when the university publicly asked supporters to stop buying or wearing unlicensed merchandise using stereotyped images of Indigenous people, and repeated its guidance that full-face or "war paint" styling is hurtful to tribal members. There is no mascot on the sideline, by design.

A Saturday in Mount Pleasant

Home games begin outside. University groups tailgate north of the stadium; students take the south end beside the video board, and one visiting reviewer described the pre-game as thumping speakers, drinking games and "fervent silliness" that carries into the ground. The Spirit Walk starts two hours and five minutes before kick-off, with the team walking from the Courtyard Marriott to the Chippewa Champions Center flanked by the Chippewa Marching Band, cheer and dance squads and whoever turns up.

Inside, the band enters through the tunnel as though it were the team, works beside the student section in the east stands and leads the fight song, the alma mater and the "Fire Up, Chips!" cheer. After a win it heads to Marching Chips Rock and raises instruments. Crowds this season have been modest in a 35,127-seat horseshoe — 19,005 against Colgate, 15,552 for Wyoming, 20,102 for Homecoming against Akron — which gives the place what the same reviewer called a cross between cosy and kinetic, and he rated Mount Pleasant one of the hidden corners of the college football map, with a warning about the narrow roads in.

Seven dates remain, and three of them are at home: Western Michigan on 17 October, Miami (Ohio) on 24 October, and a Wednesday night against Sacramento State, new to MAC football, on 11 November. The road slate is Ohio on 10 October, Eastern Michigan at Ford Field on 4 November, Buffalo on 18 November and Ball State on 28 November. Six wins gets the programme back to a bowl in consecutive seasons for the first time since the Jim McElwain era promises of the early 2020s went unmet.