Aggies’ football success helping recruitment as Rattlers rebuild from Mangum, Winslow damage

FAMU alumna Tiffany Greene conducts postgame interview as NCA&T Chancellor Harold Martin watches

On Friday, the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference’s (MEAC) preseason poll predicted that the North Carolina A&T Aggies will win the conference title for the third consecutive year. A&T went 10-2 (7-1 MEAC) in 2015.

The Greensboro News and Record reported that the A&T victory in the first Air Force Reserve Celebration Bowl in 2015, which earned the school the unofficial historically black college and university (HBCU) national football championship, brought lots of positive publicity to the university that has helped recruitment. That contest was broadcast on ABC.

NCA&T Chancellor Harold Martin reversed the school’s decline in students in Fall 2014 after two straight years of falling enrollment caused by the federal financial aid program overhaul. The freshman, first-time student classes that Martin enrolled in Fall 2014 and Fall 2015 both had 3.0+ average GPAs in high school. A&T is expecting more enrollment growth in Fall 2016.

This year, high school students across the country will have a chance to watch the Aggie football team three times on ESPNU.

FAMU finished its 2015 football season in a four-way tie for worst in the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference.

Back in 2014, FAMU Athletic Director Kellen Winslow, Sr. fired then-Head Football Coach Earl Holmes just as his team was beginning to show steady improvement. The team had won two out of its last three contests with the Homecoming game just four days away.

The 2015 Rattler football team under new Head Coach Alex Wood started out even worse than the previous year by chalking up a 0-6 record during its first games. It ended with a 1-10 record, which made it the first time in 72 years that FAMU won only one contest in an entire season.

A&T beat the Rattlers 28-10 in Bragg Memorial Stadium in 2015. The Aggies have scheduled FAMU as their homecoming game opponent this year on October 29, 2016.

FAMU also only has one scheduled appearance on the MEAC’s television schedule for this season.

The worsened state of the football program hasn't helped recruitment at FAMU. FAMU’s enrollment in Fall 2015 dropped to 9,920 (down from 10,233 in Fall 2014) under President Elmira Mangum. The decline cost FAMU $9M+ from tuition and fee losses. FAMU expects to lose about another $10M due to its projected loss of 920 students in 2016-2017.