Three Reasons Why 2026 Will Be Different

It’s been eight months since the 2025 season finished, and Eastern Michigan’s 4-8 record (3-5 MAC) still leaves a bad taste in the team’s mouth.

In the 2025 coaches’ poll, EMU was predicted to finish eighth in league play and ended up finishing ninth, the same league record as Ball State and Bowling Green.

Yesterday, the new coaches’ poll showed that the league thinks EMU might end up being a little bit better this year. They picked EMU to be the seventh-place finisher in 2026. No, it’s not the biggest vote of confidence in the world, but check this out. After his first two seasons finished with losing records, Western Michigan was picked to finish seventh by last year’s poll and it ended up winning the whole dang thing instead.

Now, WMU’s expected to win the MAC title again.

Eastern Michigan’s position entering the 2026 season is certainly a unique one. It’s the first time since 2016-2017 that it’ll feature a returning starting quarterback behind center, and, led by its defensive secondary, the team far and away has the most returning talent in the league.

There are some question marks around this team that EMU will need to have some strong answers for — Who’s gonna block for this offense? Will anybody on defense step up and be a tackling machine this time? — but what team doesn’t have its areas of uncertainty in July?

Since the team’s best season in school history back in 2022, EMU has failed to have a winning season in each of the next three seasons. Now, with just two years left on Creighton’s contract, he and this team aren’t just greatly incentivized to turn things back around in 2026. They have no choice but to play better right away.

Here are three reasons why EMU will have more to cheer about this season, which is only 37 days away:

Last year’s defense set the team back with its poor run defense and, frankly, its tackling.

Didn’t take the ball away very much, either.

Eastern allowed a nation’s-worst 232 rushing yards per game last season, surrendered 5.5 yards per rush, and was scored against 29 times on the ground. The defense was able to get nine takeaways, but that wasn’t enough to match the offense’s 14 turnovers.

So, just exactly how does EMU expect to flip its image in 2026?

For one, guys like linebacker Zach Mowchan and defensive end Jefferson Adam are healthy and able to play, and head coach Chris Creighton said his team experienced an “uninterrupted” off-season.

For two, it’s three letters (or is it two?): TTE. Tackling, takeaways, and effort.

“The biggest thing for us, we kind of stand on like TTE. Those are three big things that we're gonna stand on, and that's what we're gonna be about.” senior captain and returning All-MAC safety Bryce Llewellyn said Wednesday at MAC Media Day at Ford Field.

“When you turn on the film and watch Eastern Michigan Eagles defense, you’re gonna see them tackling physically, punching up the ball, trying to get the ball out, making those plays on the ball to get turnovers, and then having relentless effort on the field as far as how we run to the ball, sideline-to-sideline, from D-tackle all the way back to safety. Everybody's aggressive and running and go-go-go-go-go, nonstop. Which, I feel like is something that you can talk about, but we've been actually living it through spring ball, through our summer OTAs, and then it'll show up all Saturdays here in the fall too.”

Quarterback Noah Kim’s living a life he couldn’t have imagined. Was playing seven years of college football the dream for him when he first went to Michigan State out of high school?

Obviously not.

Was a second season at EMU guaranteed when he first showed up to his third college in 2025?

Also no.

But life’s funny like that sometimes. And no matter how or why Kim finds himself leading Eastern’s offense for a second year, it’s a rare opportunity that he gets to embrace for one more season.

Last year, Kim finished the year as the league’s leading passer of 2,817 yards and 402 attempts (with 18 TD, 11 INT, and a 61.4% completion rate). Great individual marks, what good do those numbers do for a returning quarterback whose team went 4-8 last year?

“Maybe the (stats) and stuff like that, small accolades like that, they’re definitely, like, a confidence booster to kind of say I can play football at a high level, but at the end of the day, I think you're measured at quarterback based on your wins and losses,” Kim said at MAC Media Day. “No matter what happens, I could throw for 1,000 yards in a season, but if we go 12-0 and win the MAC championship, I think I would take a MAC championship over any individual accolade, especially at this point in my career.

“It's like, I'm coming back for this seventh year not to just put stats up on the board. I'm coming back to help Eastern Michigan win literally every single game we step on the field.”

The spring season was a rough one for Eastern Michigan’s O-line unit. From the left to the right side of the line, let’s refresh on how things went for this group last season and see where everybody’s at in 2026:

Two starters from last year return. Gallegos is already listed as the full-fledged starter at center, but then the spots to the left and right of him are still up for grabs. Going by the team’s initial depth chart, five incoming transfers to match the five outgoing transfers will battle for immediate playing time at the guards and tackles positions.

Creighton’s visual to help explain this position group’s situation was to show an open hand with his fingers and thumb all spread apart. As the team prepares to work through camp and reach the start of the season, he’s hoping that whichever five players end up starting the first game versus Sacramento State can all come together like a closed fist, ready to fight together.

“We are going to have enough guys who are ‘above the line.’ We know that. It's still shaking out about who the first five are going to be and whatnot. There are a lot of combos, and Coach Weezy [Chris Wiesehan] has done a really good job of playing guys in multiple places, and we have done that in the spring,” Creighton said.

“The thing about our offensive line, you know, we lost five guys to the portal, we brought five guys in in January, and we quickly saw that the talent was there with that group. But… they're still learning. They're still going through things for the first time. And to be a great quarterback, you have to lead. Well, if you don't know the guys, right, and you haven't done it yet, it's hard to lead, right? On the offensive line, you can learn it and be talented. But the offensive line, if it's like this (he opened his hand), it's not going to be very good offensive line. It's got to be this (closed fist), and I really hope and believe that this summer there's been a lot of that — with the offensive line coming together as a fist.”