MMA Reinstates Football
Maine Maritime Academy has reinstated its NCAA Division III Football Program with varsity competition set to begin in 2025. The decision was announced by Maine Maritime President Jerry Paul on Monday, January 9th. The Academy also announced that it will compete in the Commonwealth Coast Conference (CCC) beginning in 2025.
The Mariners will begin competition as a sub-varsity program in 2023 and continue to replenish the roster through a sub-varsity 2024 season. The Academy also announced that it has opened a search for its next head coach, which will be followed by a search for two coordinator-level positions.
Maine Maritime is preparing for a full, 10-game slate in 2025, coinciding with the first year of competition in the CCC. The CCC features two Maine colleges, Husson University and the University of New England. Curry College, Endicott College, Nichols College, and Western New England University. Salve Regina University is presently a member of the CCC but is slated to move to the New England Men’s and Women’s Athletic Conference (NEWMAC) in 2023. Conversations are already taking place with Massachusetts Maritime regarding the resumption of the annual Admiral’s Cup, which has been played 59 times dating back to 1946. The Academy will seek to create a varsity non-conference schedule that features institutions with a similar mission.
Maine Maritime’s return to football follows an indefinite suspension that was announced on August 14, 2020, because of financial challenges faced by the Academy resulting from the pandemic, including the need for two additional sea terms to alleviate the backlog of sea days created by the cancellation of the 2020 summer sea term. Maine Maritime began fundraising to restore the program in September, and raised $562,000 over a three-month period, covering 75-percent of the Academy’s unbudgeted costs to restart the program’s operation.
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