Time for Bowden to Wave Bye-Bye?

There's no way Florida State can win. Not this time. There's losing and then there's the prospect of what Bobby Bowden and his Seminoles face come their scheduled Dec. 31, Music City Bowl Game showdown against Kentucky.

That is provided they're able to show at all. No less than 20 Seminoles, at least 11 of them starters at one time or another, have been suspended for the game as punishment for their involvement in a still-widening academic cheating scandal that's taking all of Tallahassee and the NCAA landscape by storm.

The million dollar question in it all is how much culpability legendary coach Bowden shoulder for a scandal that runs so deep its been able to gut his entire team to shreds in one full swing?

Does not the NCAA rule book itself allude to instances of loss of “institutional control” as one of the most vile of offenses? And indeed, it can be argued that if ever such a singular event screamed out such an occurrence it would be this one.

Which brings us back to Bowden, major college football's all-time winningest coach with 373 career victories. But even the staunchest of FSU fans would be hard pressed to recall many of those that have taken place over the last few seasons. FSU struggled to 7-5 this year, the fourth consecutive year they have failed to win at least 10 games, once an easy benchmark for a team that went 14 years in a row before having done so.

Thus, much like the scandal itself, there are many among NCAA Nation wondering just what that all means in now evaluating Bowden's once ironclad grip on the program.

Ask yourself does not the time of even the grandest of legends and stars began to fade away at some point? Maybe, Bobby Bowden has finally come to that point. This latest FSU debacle seems to tell us so, as do the last five years.

But don't share any tears for Bowden. He's simply reached a point in life we all come to, even the greats.

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