13 games or 13 years, gentlemen?

This is the most important game of the season, period. It is so important that I had to emphasize the period ... period.\nFactoring in a massacre at the hands of Michigan, the Hoosiers have two games left to clinch a bowl game. The first game is set for Saturday against the Minnesota Golden Gophers, who are 0-5 in the Big Ten so far this season. The second and final game of the season stacks IU against in-state rival Purdue. The Boilermakers have had the Hoosiers' number for quite some time. That number is four -- as in four straight Old Oaken Bucket victories.\nNormally, no ordinary Hoosier squad could respond to a Big Ten must-win game, but as we've seen in the month of October, this is no ordinary team. In fact, the Hoosiers are two road wins away from starting the season ordinarily and ending it extraordinarily.\nWe've also seen what the IU football team can do to opponents it should beat. I am nailing this declaration to the entrance of Memorial Stadium. This Hoosier team has two legitimate chances to clinch a bowl game. If the team can't do it, these players, their coaches and this season will have failed. Simply put, if the Hoosiers clinch, they're champs. If they don't, they're chumps.\nI know what you die-hard fans who have endured more than a decade of IU football disparagement are thinking: This team has already surpassed expectations. They're growing, they're learning and they're built for the future -- isn't that enough? \nNo, it's not. \nIf you want to be satisfied, grab a Snickers bar. If you want to be celebrated, grab a seat, and cheer this team on until your face has turned crimson.\nSpeaking of seats, Bloomington Herald-Times football columnist Chris Korman wrote last week that there are plenty of good ones left on the IU bandwagon. This is the same bandwagon that is usually dark, desolate and appropriately full of spider webs by the time Halloween hits the football season. This year, as we round the corner to November, IU is 5-4 and the bandwagon is building a crowd -- warming up the engine and waiting for one more win. Of course, as seen Saturday, that crowd will never build to 50,000.\nNonetheless, the IU fight song will continuously blare throughout Bloomington if the football team can secure a bowl berth. That is what this team has accomplished so far, highlighted by an upset against Iowa and a smackdown of the Spartans. If the Hoosiers leave Bloomington bowl-barren, then what was it all for? Well, OK, we helped cause Michigan State head coach John L. Smith to be fired. So we've got that going for us, which is nice.\nThe goal has been clear since the start of spring: play 13 games. If IU cannot win one more game for the remainder of the season, they'll finish another year without a bowl game and without a winning record. Once more, the Hoosier Nation will be without football in December, marking the 13th year in a row.\nSo what will it be, gentlemen -- 13 games or 13 years?