It will be another challenging schedule for the University of Maine football team in 2016.
First-year head coach Joe Harasymiak and the Black Bears will again play two nonconference games against Football Bowl Subdivision programs and have added two Colonial Athletic Association powers as part of their league schedule.
Continuing the recent trend to generate income for the athletic program, UMaine will open the season with road contests at FBS schools Connecticut and Toledo.
UMaine athletics on Friday night was not able to provide the guarantee amounts for those two games. Last season, UMaine was paid $400,000 to play at Boston College and $325,000 to play Tulane.
The Black Bears open on Thursday, Sept. 1, against the Huskies at Rentschler Field in East Hartford, Connecticut. UConn was 6-7 in the American Athletic Conference last season.
Ten days later, the Black Bears head to Ohio to take on the Rockets. Toledo of the Mid-American Conference went 10-2 in 2015, capped by a 32-17 win over Temple in the Marmot Boca Raton Bowl.
“That’ll really set the tone for the year,” Harasymiak said of the FBS games.
“Our guys all think that maybe they were under-recruited a little bit, which we want them to think,” he explained, “so they’ve got a little bit of a chip on their shoulder.”
The challenges also help UMaine prepare to face the CAA gauntlet, which begins after an open date. The CAA schedule includes three Football Championship Subdivision playoff teams, the first a Sept. 24 home opener against James Madison.
“That’ll be a key game for us to get started off on the right foot (in the CAA),” Harasymiak said.
The Black Bears face an Oct. 1 nonleague contest against Bryant University, then visit Delaware on Oct. 8 before returning to Alfond Stadium in Orono to play Albany on Oct. 15. UMaine heads back on the road to play at Rhode Island (Oct. 22) and William & Mary (Oct. 29), another playoff participant.
“That October stretch will be really key for us,” Harasymiak said.
“If you can win that bunch of games in October, it can set you up for a run at the playoffs,” he added.
UMaine returns home for a Nov. 5 game against Villanova, then travels to Stony Brook on Nov. 12 and hosts archrival New Hampshire, which made its 12th consecutive FCS postseason appearance last season, on Nov. 19.
UMaine will enter a new rotation in CAA play in 2016. Gone are Richmond, Towson and Elon, but the Black Bears are matched up against JMU, William & Mary and Delaware.
“All those games really come down to the fourth quarter,” Harasymiak said. “We’re trying to preach to our guys that we’ve got to do a good job in the offseason through the competitive drills that we do, some workouts, to really teach the mental part of it so they can really keep grinding and have a greater will to win that the teams we’re going up against.”