2009 Eastern Michigan Eagles football team

The 2009 Eastern Michigan Eagles football team represented Eastern Michigan University in the 2009 NCAA Division I FBS football season. Eastern Michigan competed as a member of the Mid-American Conference (MAC) West Division and played their home games in Rynearson Stadium.

Following the firing of Jeff Genyk during the 2008 season, Eastern Michigan hired Ron English, who had formerly been the defensive coordinator at the University of Michigan and the University of Louisville, as the team's head coach. The coaching change initially brought excitement to the program, as English hired a new staff, including former University of Michigan, New York Giants, and Oakland Raiders running back Tyrone Wheatley, and replaced Genyk's spread offense with a pro-style offense.

However, the change in offense proved difficult for senior quarterback Andy Schmitt, and he was largely ineffective in the first several games of the season. In the second game of the year, the Eagles traveled to Northwestern, and after trailing 21-0 in the second quarter, they tied the game at 24 with 2 minutes left, before Northwestern kicked a game winning field goal in the closing seconds. The following week, they had another trip just across the county to play Michigan. Similar to their 2006 game at Michigan State, they played a very competitive first half, only trailing by one score. But like many times before, they couldn't put two good halves together. In the second half, the Eagles were outscored 21-0 and Andy Schmitt suffered a season-ending knee injury.

The rest of the season they used former starting quarterback Kyle McMahon, and freshman Alex Gillet. Eastern scored no more than 12 points in any of the next three games, including a 56-8 loss at Central Michigan. The week after that, they nearly beat Ball State who was also winless at the time. The difference was a safety in the fourth quarter. Next, they had one more non-conference game as they traveled to Arkansas. This game was the opposite of the Michigan game — bad first half, good second half. They were down 42-0 before eventually losing 63-27. For the rest of the year, they were only close in the finale at Akron, losing by 7. In previous years, Eastern was able to get at least a few wins because of a high scoring offense. Schmitt's injury ended that, and their defense was among the worst in the nation. Eastern gave up 3,321 rushing yards (276.8 per game), more than any other team in the nation, which was their downfall. They statistically appeared to have one of the best passing defenses, allowing 150.5 passing yards per game, second only to Air Force, but this was mostly an illusion. Everyone knew they couldn't stop the run, so opponents just didn't call many pass plays.

Eastern finished the season without a win, their first winless season since 1981. The Eagles were one of two winless FBS teams (Western Kentucky was the other).