The Bowling Green football team has had a month to let its loss to arch-rival Toledo sink in.

BG had the Rockets on the ropes but failed to capitalize on it in the second half and saw a 20-point first half lead fly right out the window as the Rockets’ offense rolled for 42 second-half points en route to the Mid-American Conference title.

“For the past month we’ve been thinking about the Toledo loss,” said Jovon Burkes, BG middle linebacker and team captain.

The loss wasn’t the way this group of BG seniors wanted to end their careers, and they saw to it that they took advantage of their game against Memphis in the GMAC Bowl.

The Falcons came out roaring in the first half, much like in their game against Toledo, but this time around were able to dominate the entire four quarters while taking out the Tigers and winning the GMAC Bowl, 52-35.

It appeared as if history was about to repeat itself early in the game as BG stormed out to a 28-14 lead midway through the second quarter and looked destined to destroy Memphis.

But the Tigers had thoughts of their own and immediately scored 14 unanswered points to tie the game.

Rather than fold, the Falcons flew, scoring the next 24 points.

“A month ago we had the big lead and didn’t finish,” BG senior center Scott Mruczkowski said. “We got what we had coming to us this time.”

The reason Mruczkowski and his fellow seniors felt this way was because of the legacy they were leaving to BG.

In their four years they won a MAC West title, took two bowl wins and played on national television more than any other set of players in the program’s history.

They saw college football’s premier show – “College Football Gameday” – come to Doyt L. Perry Stadium and all of this came thanks to their 37 wins, the most of any class in BG history.

This is coming on the heels of a dark age in Falcon football.

“It’s exciting,” Burkes said. “My first year here we were 2-9 and then we went 8-3. Winning is just representing Bowling Green the right way.”

And going out winners is what this group deserved.

“The difference is like night and day,” Mruczkowski said about the team’s last two games. “We didn’t want to end our careers losing to Toledo.”

For a group that accomplished so much starting with so little, anything short of going out winners would have been unacceptable.