Deacons' season ended with a sputter

The most successful losing season for Wake Forest football, such as it was, ended Friday night.

The Deacons, in their less than illustrious history, have had more than their share of losing seasons, but none before that ended at a bowl game. Also, no other losing season featured five victories against ACC teams, and none unfolded with Wake Forest needing only another play or two at Clemson to find itself again playing for the ACC championship.

And if they had taken advantage of four turnovers, the Deacons wouldn't have been answering the question posed after a 23-17 Music City Bowl loss to Mississippi State. Instead they succumbed to three big plays — two by bowl MVP Vick Ballard, one by quarterback Chris Relf and a block of a Jimmy Newman field-goal attempt — to lose for the sixth time in eight games and finish 6-7.

So it was left to coach Jim Grobe and his players to maintain afterward that they did indeed do something this season worth remembering.

"I mean, I think it was very successful," senior linebacker Kyle Wilber said after his final game. "We made it to a bowl game. We duked it out with a really good SEC school.

"We're not at the point where we want it to be at Wake Forest, but we have a challenge here, and we can get the job done."

Wake Forest would have had a stronger case if it had been able to sustain the momentum of the first five weeks of the season, when it bounced back from an opening loss at Syracuse to beat N.C. State, Gardner-Webb, Boston College and Florida State in succession.

But the grind of a long, tough season eventually wore down the Deacons, as Grobe admitted when he described his team as leaking oil down the stretch.

His staff, taking advantage of the monthlong break, patched up the engine well enough for the Deacons to make a decent showing against the Bulldogs. But quarterback Tanner Price, under a fierce rush, was surprisingly scatter-armed, and receiver Chris Givens, who announced after the game he will forego his senior season to make himself eligible for the NFL draft, was on this occasion just another receiver playing just another game.

It was Price and Givens, especially, who made the Deacons a dangerous team this season. But Mississippi State had little trouble holding Wake Forest to 287 yards and to 2 of 17 on third-down conversion attempts.

"I told our kids in the locker room after the game, this was really a team loss," Grobe said. "We could have played better on special teams. Offensively, it's hard to beat good teams with 17 points. You've got to score more points than that.

"And defensively, you can't give up big plays. That's one of the things we want to make you do, is make you earn what you get. And we gave up too many big plays to play good defense. And it's a shame because I thought overall defensively, we had a chance to have a really good night."

The departure of Givens, who set the school record for receiving yards in a season, will hurt. And for Price to make the next step at quarterback, the coaches will have to find four new starters on the offensive line and determine just what they have at running back.

Josh Harris, whose hamstring injury dropped him from first-team featured back to kickoff-return specialist, produced only 20 rushing yards on 10 carries the final seven games. He said after the bowl he hadn't decided if he'll be back next year, but as a redshirt sophomore, his options are limited.

If he transfers to another Division I program, he must sit out a year and then will have only one season of eligibility remaining under the NCAA rule that allows a player a window of five years to play four seasons.

The defense looks more promising, especially if cornerback Bud Noel can avoid a sophomore slump, if younger role players such as linebackers Justin Jackson, Mike Olson and Zachary Allen can emerge as stars and if veterans such as nose guard Nikita Whitlock, defensive end Zach Thompson and linebackers Riley Haynes, Scott Betros and Joey Ehrmann can provide the leadership the Deacons got this season from Wilber, safeties Josh Bush and Cyhl Quarles and defensive end Tristan Dorty.

But before Grobe turned his sights to spring football, and the hope that springs eternal with the blooming of freshmen shedding their red shirts, he addressed the legacy of a team that climbed out of last year's 3-9 ditch to make the program competitive again.

"When you get to a bowl game, you've had a good year," Grobe said. "We're a pretty good football team. We just played a bunch of really good teams.

"I think Mississippi State is the same way. That's a really good football team we got beat by (Friday), but they play in a great league and play great competition.

"We're the same way at Wake Forest. We play great people every Saturday, and when you play good people every Saturday and you win enough to get in a bowl game, you've had a good year."