Top Flight D 2 / D 3 Football Programs

DII- Grand Valley is consistently solid and much of the conference has been good at one time or another in the last 15 years (except my alma mater, natch)

DIII- Mt Union is the gold standard, but you could always go a different route and pick Wabash or DePauw and play in the oldest trophy rivalry game in the nation

 

stay out of the PNW for D-III. values count at those schools.

 

He's in the Northeast in top HS program but not an area that is overall a football hotbed. Not enough foundries or refineries.

 

What interests him and what might be his major?

 

The Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference (PSAC) might be a good fit. Sixteen-team conference, and the football is getting better all the time. Shippensburg made the final eight last year, I believe; its offense looked unstoppable at times and its QB won the Harlon Hill Trophy, D-II's version of the Heisman.

Other upward-trending football schools in the PSAC: California (Pa.), Indiana (Pa.), Bloomsburg.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pennsylvania_State_Athletic_Conference

 

Close to home, University of New Haven went 9 - 0 last season.

If he's a better player than student, maybe he can leverage that to his advantage and get into a better academic setting than he might on the strength of his grades alone.

Johns Hopkins football is D-III, for example. www.hopkinssports.com/sports/m-footbl/jhop-m-footbl-body.html

Also Wheaton; Ohio Wesleyan; Lake Forest; Concordia - all great academic opportunities.

 

Expanding on the idea of doing this in reverse - ie., using his football talent to leverage a better academic opportunity - here's the wiki of DIII football programs.

He's not likely to get into Amherst, but there's no reason to think he shouldn't shoot for Hamilton or Middlebury or Colby or Bowdoin or Macalaster, etc.


en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_NCAA_Division_III_football_programs

 

Ah Canyon. Where the men are men and the sheep are nervous.

 

That's always been a solid league. I remember first learning about Blomsberg when the Giants had a TE
from there - Bob Tucker.

 

What position does the kid play? Like Shottie said, Shippensburg's offense was ridiculous this season. The offensive coordinator came in a couple of years ago and put in a spread that put up all kinds of points and the players looked like they were having a blast, but the head coach is a defensive guy and there were a couple of real studs on that side of the ball too. Both coaches seem like decent enough guys in my limited dealings with them.

 

Keep in mind that, if he's into them - can't assume - there are no women at Wabash.

 

Good call on the PSAC. I'm friends with the former head coach at Kutztown, who is now at Arkansas Tech. IUP seems to put a good team on the field almost every year.

Glenville State in West Virginia made some noise in D2 a couple of years ago. The South Atlantic Conference (Carson Newman, Catawba) plays decent football, but its champ usually ends up losing to a Gulf South team in the playoffs every year.