Borussia Dortmund Need Cup Win to Make Already Successful Season Memorable

Borussia Dortmund have enjoyed a very successful first season under head coach Thomas Tuchel. Fans asking themselves whether they should be happy with the way the campaign went ought to look at last year's Bundesliga table—or Bleacher Report's statistical comparison of the two seasons.

Had a genie offered the Black and Yellows a second-place finish in the league with a record-breaking 78 points—scoring a club-record 82 goals in the process—a quarter-final appearance in the UEFA Europa League and a third-straight trip to the DFB-Pokal final in Berlin's Olympiastadion, they'd have taken it without hesitation.

With the final still to play, this season's legacy is on the line. The question remains how fans will remember it in three years, or in five or in 10, should Dortmund lose to Bayern Munich on Saturday.

Will anyone think back to the excellent football the team produced, to the incredible campaign of one Henrikh Mkhitaryan and the way Tuchel answered every question about his aptitude for coaching a big club?

Clive Brunskill/Getty Images

Or will they remember another final lost and another time their club couldn't quite hang with their bitter rivals from Bavaria?

As of right now, the most poignant memory of Dortmund's campaign is a negative one. The Ruhr side were on the wrong side of a historic night on Merseyside, and it left a dent not even a cup win would fix over night.

Raphael Honigstein wrote for ESPN FC: 

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Their Europa League quarter-final defeat at the hands of Jurgen Klopp's Liverpool hurt the Black and Yellows more than most people imagine. The Westphalians were desperate to become one of the handful of clubs that have lifted all three European trophies, and the nightmarish evening at Anfield probably played at least a small role in convincing Mats Hummels that his thirst for silverware will be more easily quenched at his boyhood club, Bayern, instead.

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Adding another defeat in a final—Dortmund have lost one in each year since the 2012/13 campaign—would cast a large shadow over their season. As Honigstein points out, "they will come to regret not maximising their potential if they lose the cup final in Berlin."

Even though chief executive Hans-Joachim Watzke told the club's official website after the semi-final win over Hertha BSC that "we have to set ourselves apart from this title mania," a defeat against Bayern wouldn't only hurt the fans.

Dortmund have a number of excellent players who have never won a major trophy with the club (the German Supercup doesn't count): Marco Reus, at the Westfalenstadion since 2012, has never won a trophy in his career; Mkhitaryan, who joined the team in 2013, last won silverware in Ukraine with Shakhtar Donetsk; and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, having arrived a few weeks before the Armenian, has won one league cup in France.

PATRIK STOLLARZ/Getty Images

At some point, losing the biggest games of their season again and again will have a cumulative effect on the team. To avoid their negative streak turning into a self-fulfilling prophecy, Dortmund need to hoist silverware, and soon.

That's easier said than done having to go up against a Bayern side that thumped them 5-1 in the first meeting of the season and was close to a win at Dortmund in the return match that ended in a goalless draw.

It's also Pep Guardiola's final match in charge of the Bavarians, which can only add spice to the already-tasty affair that has dominated German football for the better part of the last five years.

Spoiling the Catalan's going-away party would serve as a crowning moment of Tuchel's first season in charge and make sure the campaign won't be remembered for the wrong reasons.

For however strong their performances were, they won't matter much if Dortmund don't come away with the cup.

Lars Pollmann is a Featured Columnist writing on Borussia Dortmund. He also writes for YellowWallPod.com. You can follow him on Twitter.