Hines: Try telling Iowa State football that bowl games don't matter

Hines: Try telling Iowa State football that bowl games don’t matter

Posted by Admin December 29, 2024 Football

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ORLANDO – It’s easy to be cynical and critical about bowl games.

For good reason. Even before the College Football Playoff was introduced, there was plenty to take aim at for games that often saddled schools with big bills and too often mediocre games.

Now, with the transfer portal and the CFP, it’s never been easier to be dismissive about games that don’t feel particularly meaningful.

Then, though, you see things like Saturday night.

With J.R. Singleton calling No. 19 Iowa State’s 42-41 Pop-Tarts Bowl victory over No. 16 Miami one of his best moments as a Cyclone.

With Jaylin Noel hilariously clutching a toaster trophy and making a beeline toward his teammates.

With Matt Campbell fighting back tears as he listened to Noel talk about his love of this team.

These games don’t matter toward a national championship or even a national conversation. They don’t even tell us much about teams, with rosters ravaged by the realities of the business this sport really is.

They matter, though, to the men on the field. To players who get one final time to play this game with their teammates and in that uniform.

“This team means the world to me,” Noel said, “and there’s no better way to go out than a champion.

“Those guys come in every day and look up to me, and if I wasn’t going to play, then that’s just not what leaders do, I feel like. So to be able to play in this game and be able to go out there one last time with this team, it means everything to me.”

That one last time provided an 11th win, the most in school history. No one will confuse it with the Big 12 title that could have been or the spot in the College Football Playoff that would have come with it, but no one on that field Saturday night will forget it, either.

“This is how you want to do it,” Singleton said. “You want to leave a mark on the program you’re at. Not just the program but the people in it.

“We’re a family. We’re a team. A lot of guys, all they want is money and things like that. If you work hard, I believe that God is always going to give you enough. You really want to have an effect on the people you’re around.

“That’s what I strive for. That’s what all these seniors strove for, and now you see the success.”

You saw what the opportunity to go one last time meant when it was cruelly taken away, too.

Beau Freyler, an all-time Cyclone great who has played through an assortment of ailments and agony in his career, had to be carted to the locker room in the first half after suffering a leg injury.

If anyone had earned a triumphant career finale, it was Freyler. But life, and this game, aren’t fair.

“There’s no greater warrior that has given everything — his body, his heart, his mind, his soul — to a program than that player has,” Campbell said. “He’ll go down as one of the great leaders of all time in this football program, and he should be considered that forever.”

Tell Freyler this game doesn’t matter. Tell Singleton. Tell Noel.

“They are going to talk about Jaylin Noel forever,” Campbell said, “and they are going to talk about Beau forever, and they are going to talk about Rocco (Becht) forever.”

No doubt, the Pop-Tarts Bowl is a trifle of a game, full of silliness and jokes. It’s a sideshow for the postseason. It’s a risk for guys like Iowa State’s Darien Porter and Jayden Higgins, who opted not to play one final game as they prepare for their pro careers. For Cam Ward, the Miami quarterback and potential No. 1 pick in this spring’s NFL Draft, who played in the first half and sat out the second.

It’s all those things. But it’s also the most important game in their lives for some of those players who will never again take a college football field. Who will never again line up next to that teammate. Who will never again share a locker room with this group of guys.

“When you have a great locker room and your players demand it every day, it’s pretty easy for everybody else to fall in line,” Campbell said. “We are really fortunate, because in our locker room, our players demand greatness, every day since January, and really you’ve seen it in some really tough moments.

“We are really proud and grateful for our guys.”

They showed it Saturday.

In a game that didn’t mean a dang thing, but also meant the world.

Iowa State decided it mattered to them. So they went out and won the thing.

Together. One last time.

Iowa State columnist Travis Hines has covered the Cyclones for the Des Moines Register and Ames Tribune since 2012. Contact him at thines@amestrib.com or (515) 284-8000. Follow him on X at @TravisHines21.