NEC’s football team is continuing to build a roster while coaching staff prepare for the upcoming Fall 2024 season. NEC announced that football would be returning after a 50-year hiatus.
According to Head Coach Kevin Kelly, the coaching staff will include three full-time coaches, four graduate assistants and part-time coaches.
The graduate assistants are from all different schools.
“Ones from Dartmouth, ones from Castleton, ones from Mass-Martitime,” Kelly said. “They come for their masters and experience in coaching.”
Recruitment is a main focus, Kelly said, but one barrier is the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FASFA) is delayed this year, causing athletes to not figure out how much scholarship and grant money they can get to come to NEC.
“We have around 50 [recruits],” Kelly said. “We’ve had 145 guys visit the campus.”
Coach Kelly said the recruiting process has been difficult because NEC is a first-year program.
“We’re a program that’s starting from scratch,” Kelly said. “Its been different.”
Among the tasks for establishing a new team is ordering grear. Kelly has ordered 70 speed flex helmets, which will be fitted in small, medium, and large for each player, along with white and blue jerseys. The white jerseys will be the away jersey, and the blue will be the home jerseys.
Although there is no set football field for home games, the team will be practicing on the NEC rugby field until plans are finalized for a home football field.
The football team will return to campus on Aug. 14 and the first practice will be the 15th.
The first game of the pre-varsity schedule will be on Sept. 7 in Plymouth, against Plymouth State.
