University of New Haven will go D1

[NewHaven Alum]

New Haven will begin its transition to NCAA Division I and the NEC during the 2025-26 academic year. The Chargers will attain full Division I membership in 2028-29 following the NCAA-mandated reclassification period. Very interesting. What do ya'll think? Good idea, bad idea or something expected.

https://newhavenchargers.com/news/20...ip-invite.aspx

[yellowjacketalum]

Just saw this on the news. I knew this would happen. It was a matter of when. So, will this up coming season be the last the Chargers will play in?

[NewHaven Alum]

Just saw this on the news. I knew this would happen. It was a matter of when. So, will this up coming season be the last the Chargers will play in?

New Haven will be integrated into NEC athletic schedules beginning with the 2025-26 academic year, with the exception of football. The timing of New Haven football's addition to the conference schedule is still to be determined. So yes, New Haven will fulfill its current schedule this year 2025-26, after that? We don't know.

[cwfenn]

The day us Chargers have been expecting for years has finally come, and now I'm going to throw cold water on it. Sorry in advance.

Football-wise, it's an odd thing the NEC is doing with New Haven given previous schools went right in and played conference opponents. Thinking the NEC is looking to slot New Haven into the St. Francis U spot when they drop to Division 3 next year, unless New Haven thinks they can place football somewhere else. I don't see that happening, at least not right now anyway. Robert Morris tried that for football and it failed so badly that they came back to the NEC.

Get ready for the Pincince Bowl in a couple years (Chris' brother Tom is CCSU's athletic director).

I'll be honest - I don't know if I like the move. Division 1 athletics, which was always a "haves vs. have-nots" game, has become even more decidedly so. Teams at the level New Haven will compete at in Division 1 (the NEC is either the lowest or close to the lowest-rated D1 conference in nearly every sport) can expect to either get hammered by most better competition, or if they have any drop of success, lose their coach and/or players to wealthier programs, which will be pretty much any program not in the NEC or the smaller southern conferences. Never mind the inevitable pay games they will have to do to keep the athletic department afloat or risk dropping to D3 like St. Francis U did. New Haven has to accept that they are not a destination program anymore (if they ever were). Ideally, I would like to see New Haven in a more competitive conference like the MAAC (where Quinnipiac is), but we'll see about that when I'm on the other side of 50.

Maybe my opinion of this is shaped by having gone there and seeing some great things during the Sparano years (the 1997 season was during my senior year) and I don't want bad things to happen to them. Possibly that's why I'm having a hard time getting excited over this. I guess I should probably be more realistic, since the NE10 isn't exactly full of titans, but at least there was a feeling of hope. Like the Slippery Rock game last year, I knew New Haven wasn't favored, but I thought they could hang in there with them, and they did end up having a shot at winning. At D1, I'm not so sure about it, at least not outside of conference play.

I wish there was some more clarity on paying athletes and the chaos of the transfer portal before this move was made, but I guess that given there is such a long transition period to D1, they had to pull the trigger sooner than later. At least they raised a boatload of money and got those building projects going, because Charger Gym is definitely not a D1 building, not as I remember it, anyway.

Of course, I'm still going to pull for the Chargers as hard as I always have (after 30+ years it's practically genetic), but I remember back when a school moving up was a big deal because their program had done something big and was going to bring that to the next level, like North Dakota State had with their football program. Now it seems like anyone who moves up is thrown into a tornado of NIL payments, coaching changes, and transfer chaos and I don't know if I want that for my school, which has avoided a big chunk of it to this point (as best as I know). I sincerely hope the university has a good plan and a strong grasp of what they are doing. It's going to be a really bumpy ride for a while.

[Finchwidget]

Football-wise, it's an odd thing the NEC is doing with New Haven given previous schools went right in and played conference opponents. Thinking the NEC is looking to slot New Haven into the St. Francis U spot when they drop to Division 3 next year, unless New Haven thinks they can place football somewhere else. I don't see that happening, at least not right now anyway. Robert Morris tried that for football and it failed so badly that they came back to the NEC.

When Mercyhurst announced they were moving up last April, they only ended up playing around half of the teams in the NEC that season in football, because at that point almost everyone in the FCS had locked in their schedules for the season, and not every team was able to move dates around or get out of prior obligations to make room for Mercyhurst on the schedule. They ultimately had to cobble together a Franken-schedule that included D3 Buffalo State, Lincoln (CA), and an away game at Montana State to fill in the rest of their dates. It's now May, which means that New Haven and the NEC would have even less time than Mercyhurst did to try to make a schedule, so I'm guessing both parties agreed they didn't want to go through the headache this deep into the offseason.

As an aside, you've always been a quality poster and contributor on this site, and I appreciate your insight here as well as elsewhere. Hope you'll continue to stay active on the boards in spite of the Chargers making the move up (although certainly I wouldn't fault you if you didn't, I imagine it'll be a little different now without having an active stake in the competition).

[cwfenn]

When Mercyhurst announced they were moving up last April, they only ended up playing around half of the teams in the NEC that season in football, because at that point almost everyone in the FCS had locked in their schedules for the season, and not every team was able to move dates around or get out of prior obligations to make room for Mercyhurst on the schedule. They ultimately had to cobble together a Franken-schedule that included D3 Buffalo State, Lincoln (CA), and an away game at Montana State to fill in the rest of their dates. It's now May, which means that New Haven and the NEC would have even less time than Mercyhurst did to try to make a schedule, so I'm guessing both parties agreed they didn't want to go through the headache this deep into the offseason.

As an aside, you've always been a quality poster and contributor on this site, and I appreciate your insight here as well as elsewhere. Hope you'll continue to stay active on the boards in spite of the Chargers making the move up (although certainly I wouldn't fault you if you didn't, I imagine it'll be a little different now without having an active stake in the competition).

Thanks for the information about Mercyhurst.

While nothing is set in stone yet, I would like to keep covering the Lone Star, so hopefully that will be my way of staying around.

[cwfenn]

The NE10's statement on the New Haven move:

https://northeast10.org/news/2025/5/...new-haven.aspx

[PSAC77]

Does anyone know if the NEC still has the 45 limit on scholarships instead of the FCS limit of 63? Will NH go up to this level? I don't think they were at the D-2 36 limit. How are they planning to fund this?

[cwfenn]

Does anyone know if the NEC still has the 45 limit on scholarships instead of the FCS limit of 63? Will NH go up to this level? I don't think they were at the D-2 36 limit. How are they planning to fund this?

According to these articles, I think the NEC will allow up to the current FCS maximum, which is 63 for the upcoming year:

https://fearthefcs.com/2024/11/14/no...larship-limit/

https://www.ncsasports.org/football/scholarships

As far as funding is concerned, I know New Haven has been very aggressive in fundraising for nearly the past decade, completing two large campaigns that ended up raising more money than expected. The university played a very long game with the D1 move, but I don't know where they want to be at with scholarships. I hope they know, that seems to be kind of important.

[Fightingscot82]

According to these articles, I think the NEC will allow up to the current FCS maximum, which is 63 for the upcoming year:

https://fearthefcs.com/2024/11/14/no...larship-limit/

https://www.ncsasports.org/football/scholarships

As far as funding is concerned, I know New Haven has been very aggressive in fundraising for nearly the past decade, completing two large campaigns that ended up raising more money than expected. The university played a very long game with the D1 move, but I don't know where they want to be at with scholarships. I hope they know, that seems to be kind of important.

New Haven is private, so unless money is donated specifically for that purpose, their scholarships are discounts, not donations. The smaller dollars supplement the equipment & travel budgets, refresh offices & locker rooms, etc. But you also don't cultivate a culture for big donations without going hard after the little stuff.

I think its good for New Haven. It helps differentiate them from SCSU and they'll be able to more regularly square off against peer and aspirational schools like Quinnipiac, Yale, Fairfield, Sacred Heart, etc.

But...NEC is D1 in name only. It technically qualifies New Haven for a lot (eventually FBS money games, March Madness payouts, etc). They'll remain a farm team for Quinnipiac and UConn. They're going from middle of the pack D2 program to bottom 20% in D1.