(AP Photo/Gerry Broome)

Senior Day at Kenan needs to be more sweet than bitter.

There will be a tendency to not properly thank the seniors who are playing, or watching, their last home game against Western Carolina Saturday. Yes, this season has been pretty much a wash-out, but the win at Pitt proves the players have not quit and actually have improved as the schedule wore on.

With the injury list hovering around 20 each week, who knows how many seniors will actually suit up and play against the Catamounts. But the unprecedented season-enders have gotten some younger players ready before their time, and that will pay dividends in years to come. Whether a backhanded compliment to the walking wounded, they will surely share in the future success of Tar Heel football.

It has to be a trying season for Larry Fedora and his staff, but they come back to coach again next year with a clean slate. The Austin Proehls, Tyler Powells and Donnie Miles will have moved on after being sidelined, and don’t they wish they could have kept playing and helped the Tar Heels earn a few more victories.

So when they are introduced, I hope a representative crowd will cheer them and pay gratitude to their efforts and those that followed them into battle.  It will be important to win this game and avoid the dreaded 10-loss season that sticks on your record like a stain. And a second straight victory and continued improvement will give the team a mindset that it can win in Raleigh next week

How do injured players have a role in the growth of a football team? You see them advising teammates as they come off the field, making them better players capable of beating a hot Pitt team on its home field on national television, which left the impression with thousands of viewers that these Tar Heel aren’t as bad as advertised.

There will be no bowl game and the final record will leave them at the bottom of the 2018 preseason rankings. But if Carolina Football recovers next fall, these seniors, no matter how many games they played this season, will have had a lot to do with it. We won’t be able to thank them properly then. So let’s do it Saturday.