Motor City Preview: Central Michigan

With the first bowl featuring a Big Ten team less than one week away, The Chronicle has decided to roll out our first in many previews to come for this year's bowl season. The Motor City Bowl is played on Wednesday, December 26th at 7:30PM and will feature the Big Ten's Purdue Boilermakers and the MAC Champion Central Michigan Chippewas. Here is a closer look at Purdue's opponent: Central Michigan Chippewas 8-5 (MAC 6-1, 1st) Central Michigan earned another Motor City Bowl berth by repeating as Mid-American Conference champions. The Chippewas were Champions of the MAC last year under Brian Kelly, now the coach at Cincinnati, then did it again under new head coach Butch Jones this season. CMU led the MAC in scoring in 2007, with sophomore quarterback Dan LeFevour leading the way. LeFevour joined current NFL QB Vince Young as the only Division 1 college quarterbacks to throw for more than 3,000 yards and run for another 1,000 in the same season. LeFevour was named 2007 MAC Offensive Player of the Year and is surrounded by talent at the skill positions, especially wide receivers Bryan Anderson and Antonio Brown. For as fast as the CMU offense can score points, its defense is just as good at giving them up. Central Michigan allowed opponents 36 points a game this season, a number inflated by the Chippewas’ appearances against BCS-conference opponents. They conceded 52 points to Kansas, 70 to Clemson, and 45 to the Boilermakers in their previous meeting on September 15th of this year. The low point for this year's defense may have been allowing 44 points in a loss to Division 1-AA (FCS) school North Dakota State.