21 December 2014. Matchday 21 of 30. Sint-Truiden, a Limburg club with yellow-and-black kits and a hard-edged provincial following, walked off the pitch with a five-point lead over the second-period chasers and only one more match left in the period. The title was not technically clinched yet, but the math was almost beyond doubt. Sint-Truiden would win the period, qualify for the playoff, and from a 12-point cushion in the overall table they would not be caught. Belgian Second Division titles are usually decided in April. This one was effectively decided four days before Christmas.
The 2014-15 season ran from 1 August to 26 April under the Belgacom League name. The league still divided each season into three periods, with each period winner earning a place in the final-round playoff. The first period went to Oud-Heverlee Leuven, settled on matchday 10 on 5 October 2014. The second went to Sint-Truiden in late December. The third went to Lommel United on the very last matchday, after they lost to Sint-Truiden but Eupen failed by three goals to overtake them on goal difference. With Sint-Truiden already champions and directly promoted, Eupen took their playoff slot instead.
Sint-Truiden is not a famous club outside Belgium. It is famous enough inside it. The club had bounced between the top two divisions for decades, and the 2014-15 title sent them back to the Pro League where they would settle in for the next decade. The leading scorer was the Congolese-born Frenchman Hilaire Momi, with 12. The captain through much of the season was Joeri Dequevy, who had been a top scorer the year before as well. The squad was unflashy, well-organised, and built specifically for this division. By Christmas they had outpaced everyone.
If Sint-Truiden's story is the easy promotion, the more melancholy story is RAEC Mons. Mons had been in the Belgian Pro League the season before. They were relegated after finishing 16th in 2013-14, dropped into this second-division season, and never recovered. Harlem Gnohere scored 11 for them, but the club was already collapsing financially. Within a few years RAEC Mons, founded in 1910, would dissolve entirely. A new amateur successor club would be founded to keep the name and the colours alive in the provincial leagues. The 2014-15 second-division campaign was, in retrospect, the last serious season Mons would ever play.
Strip away the periods and the playoff arithmetic and the 2014-15 Belgian Second Division was about two things. It was about Sint-Truiden's long climb back to the top flight, which they accomplished without drama and without much rest. And it was about a generation of Belgian clubs - Mons, RWDM Brussels (folded the previous summer), Boussu Dour (sold its license), Visé (relegated and effectively dissolved) - quietly running out of money. The second division was a healthy league with a sick lower edge. The 2018-19 reform that turned this competition into the eight-club First Division B was already, in 2014-15, becoming inevitable.
Sint-Truiden plays at Stayen (50.81N, 5.18E) in the Limburg province of Belgium, about 70 km east of Brussels and 30 km southwest of Hasselt. Nearest airport is Liege (EBLG), 35 km south. The 2014-15 league spanned Flanders and Wallonia, with most clubs within a 130 km radius of Brussels (EBBR). Recommended viewing altitude 3,000 to 4,500 ft over the rolling Haspengouw fruit country east of Sint-Truiden, particularly in April when the orchards bloom.