He did, but the republicans still got blamed. But Cruz was able to polish his conservative credentials which is all he cared about.
Now if he was a master politician he would have worked out how to get Obama blamed for shutting the government instead of the GOP getting hammered and actually achieved something useful. But that's pretty much par for the course, lots of posturing and few useful results.
True, and that reality won’t be forgotten IF he wins the nomination. He’ll never win the election, just not possible.