Close. Really close. Much closer than the 10-point margin on the scoreboard.

The nicest thing you can say about Air Force’s season is the Falcons keep coming close. But that’s the cruelest thing you can say, too. This team fails, over and over, to seize the chances that could turn a close, depressing loss into an uplifting victory.

The Falcons lost, as expected, to Boise State on Saturday night at Falcon Stadium. They doomed themselves on two disastrous plays.

The first disaster ended the weirdest sequence I’ve seen at an Air Force football game. With 25 seconds left in the first half, Brett Rypien missed a wide-open John Hightower in the end zone, and the Falcons seemed sure — sure! — to sprint into halftime with a 28-21 lead.

Somehow, that didn’t happen.

On fourth down, Rypien lofted a 35-yard touchdown to C.T. Thomas. Boom. The Falcons traveled from elated to deflated in an instant. On consecutive plays, Boise receivers sizzled the Falcons secondary. Both were on deep sideline routes.

“That’s what you’re going to get with Air Force,” Rypien said of Boise’s deep strategy. “They’re going to play one-on-one coverage, but we felt like we had good chances to run by them. You play the percentages. You know you’re not going to hit them all, especially when you’re throwing the ball that far down the field, but thankfully we were able to hang in there and we hit them when we needed them.”

They sure did. Remember what Rypien said. We’ll return to his strategy soon.

The second disaster arrived in the fourth quarter. Boise had bolted to a 10-point lead, but quarterback Isaiah Sanders led a Falcon rally that kept fans in their seats on a gorgeous fall night. Boise’s lead was cut to 41-38, and the Broncos had strong reason to be nervous.

On second and 9 with 3:25 left, Rypien dropped back and lofted a soaring pass down the west sideline to Hightower. Boom, again. The 61-yard touchdown, on a deep sideline route, silenced the crowd, except for small batch of fans wearing orange and blue.

Coach Troy Calhoun, as usual, didn’t say much after the loss. He did say this:

“We need to be better as we move forward.”

That is dead-on correct, coach.

The Falcons have lost eight of 11 Football Bowl Subdivision games and seven of nine Mountain West games. They are in danger of tumbling into irrelevance in 2018, and beyond.

Any trip to Army is crucial for Air Force’s team, but few have been as important as Saturday’s game at West Point. A victory will give Air Force its fifth Commander in Chief’s title since 2003. A victory will ease the humiliation from the Black Knights’ ultra-dominating 21-0 win last season at Falcon Stadium.

I have a strong feeling Air Force will play the Black Knights close.

But losing close, yet again, will do nothing to rescue this lost season.