2026 Schedules

[BaboNation]

Babson

Babson had a down, or at least uneven, year in 2025 by their lofty standards, that looked a lot better by year's end.  Ties to UMass Boston and Covenant were troubling, but both teams ended up having pretty strong seasons, and an uncommon three game losing streak with losses to Roger Williams, Brandeis, and Amherst, plus four dispiriting conference results - ties to Salve Regina and Coast Guard and losses to Emerson and Wheaton - put Babson at risk of not making the NCAA tournament.  They turned it around to win the NEWMAC tournament and then beat Oneonta to advance to the second round before falling to Conn College on two PKs, the second in the 81st minute.  This year's schedule is a bit less challenging than last year's.  No extensive travel to Georgia, no UMass Boston or a good Occidental team to push them on opening weekend, and they get Amherst, Salve Regina, Emerson, and Coast Guard at home this season.  Tufts away will be a big hill to climb and Brandeis and Wheaton away should be challenges again, but they get newly resurgent Bates at home instead of Wesleyan. Plus, with the exception of a couple of players on the backline, they get all their starters back, including all their top scorers (especially Yablonovskiy), and their freshman/sophomore starters will have a year of experience under their belts.

Turns out Babson's schedule that I discussed was a work-in-progress as @BaboNation suggested.  It certainly doesn't get any stronger with the additions though.

On the 9/5-9/6 weekend that I pointed out was surprisingly free of games, Babson will be traveling to New Hampshire to play the Keene State tournament against Keene State and Ramapo.  No disrespect for those two teams - they both had winning records last season, albeit barely - but not quite the same level as UMass Boston or Oxy or the rigors of travel to Covenant/Oglethorpe.  Perhaps there are more games coming.

I agree with your assessment.

I still think Sat. 9/13 likely gets filled at least. I can't remember the last time the team was in town and didn't play on a Saturday.  They can't be traveling far that weekend with a home game with Roger Williams on the following Tuesday.

Staying within the NEWMAC I'd really like to see Wheaton step up a level in SOS with their non-conference.  They should be very good again this year.

[Kuiper]

Babson

Babson had a down, or at least uneven, year in 2025 by their lofty standards, that looked a lot better by year's end.  Ties to UMass Boston and Covenant were troubling, but both teams ended up having pretty strong seasons, and an uncommon three game losing streak with losses to Roger Williams, Brandeis, and Amherst, plus four dispiriting conference results - ties to Salve Regina and Coast Guard and losses to Emerson and Wheaton - put Babson at risk of not making the NCAA tournament.  They turned it around to win the NEWMAC tournament and then beat Oneonta to advance to the second round before falling to Conn College on two PKs, the second in the 81st minute.  This year's schedule is a bit less challenging than last year's.  No extensive travel to Georgia, no UMass Boston or a good Occidental team to push them on opening weekend, and they get Amherst, Salve Regina, Emerson, and Coast Guard at home this season.  Tufts away will be a big hill to climb and Brandeis and Wheaton away should be challenges again, but they get newly resurgent Bates at home instead of Wesleyan. Plus, with the exception of a couple of players on the backline, they get all their starters back, including all their top scorers (especially Yablonovskiy), and their freshman/sophomore starters will have a year of experience under their belts.

Turns out Babson's schedule that I discussed was a work-in-progress as @BaboNation suggested.  It certainly doesn't get any stronger with the additions though.

On the 9/5-9/6 weekend that I pointed out was surprisingly free of games, Babson will be traveling to New Hampshire to play the Keene State tournament against Keene State and Ramapo.  No disrespect for those two teams - they both had winning records last season, albeit barely - but not quite the same level as UMass Boston or Oxy or the rigors of travel to Covenant/Oglethorpe.  Perhaps there are more games coming.

I agree with your assessment.

I still think Sat. 9/13 likely gets filled at least. I can't remember the last time the team was in town and didn't play on a Saturday.  They can't be traveling far that weekend with a home game with Roger Williams on the following Tuesday.

Staying within the NEWMAC I'd really like to see Wheaton step up a level in SOS with their non-conference.  They should be very good again this year.

I agree with you on Wheaton should be strong this year and want to build on their QF appearance in the NCAA Tournament last season.  I assume they will be losing top scorer/assist man Aidan Doyle (who played his first two years at D1 Stonehill) and their starting GK and several starting defenders, but they have a lot of talent returning.  Last season, they played Williams and Brandeis, but otherwise it looked like a NESCAC non-conference schedule where they weren't challenged as much. 

[Kuiper]

A couple of really interesting schedules from out in Region X

Redlands

New Redlands coach Alex Ortega has constructed a pretty ambitious schedule for his first year after leaving Amherst for the west coast.  They added SCIAC and D3 newcomer Azusa Pacific to the schedule in place of UC Santa Cruz and Nelson (AZ) (NCCAA), but the rest of the schedule is going to be a challenge.  They had to replace a bunch of one-off games from a slew of long road trips last season in Ralph Perez's retirement tour on the east coast.  The positive is that Ortega managed to do that with a schedule that basically keeps the team at home or close to home basically until October when they travel to Eagle Rock to play Oxy.  They open against Whittier in a non-conference game, which is something I haven't seen SCIAC schools do very often, if at all, lately.  SCIAC teams play all but three other teams in a home-and-away series, so it makes sense to play one or more of the single game teams again, but most teams want to play against other teams for variety or to enhance strength-of-schedule.  For the latter issue, that won't be necessary for Redlands because not only is Whittier likely to be one of the better SCIAC teams, but they also have Final Four team Emory and SCAC finalist Colorado College visiting Redlands.  I expect Colorado College will be better this year as they should have all but two starters returning and all of their leading scorers.  Redlands is returning its top scorers - Beckton and Darmanyan - and some of its starters, but it doesn't have a goalkeeper returning with any college experience and it has an entirely new coaching staff.  Non-conference should be a big test for the team.

Colorado College

Always the most fun schedule for the variety, the ambition, and the audacious travel for the most deserted of island schools in all of D3.  The first weekend of the season they host Whitworth (NWC) and Wheaton (IL) (CCIW) (which rivals Colorado College this season for the most diverse schedule).  Both those teams also play Austin College.  Then, Colorado College travels to Southern California for the return game against Cal Lutheran (SCIAC) and the game against Redlands (SCIAC) mentioned above.  The following weekend, they travel to Wisconsin to play Carroll (CCIW) and UW-Eau Claire (WIAC). The next weekend, they travel to Lincoln, NE (8 hour bus ride if they aren't flying) to play Nebraska Wesleyan (ARC) and St. John's University (MN) (MIAC).  After that they open SCAC play by flying to Arkansas to play Hendrix and Ozarks.  After 9-4/9-5, they don't have another home game until 10-9/10-11 when St. Thomas and Centenary travel to Colorado Springs.  That's a heck of a lot of travel the first month of the season!

[Kuiper]

TCNJ

TCNJ made a dramatic turnaround last season, going from 2-12-5 in 2024 to 11-5-5 in 2025.  Big achievement, but to some extent it was done by feasting on some weaker teams early in the season (5-0 over Immaculata, 6-0 over Penn State Berks, 4-1 over Penn State Harrisburg, 4-0 over Farmingdale State, 3-0 over Keystone), which seemed to give them some confidence and changed the culture of expecting to lose.  By the end of the season, they were beating up on NJAC teams (5-1 over Rutgers-Camden and 4-1 over Montclair State before losing to Rowan 1-0 in the NJAC championship game).  In 2026, only Farmingdale State remains from those early season lopsided wins of 2025 and they also aren't playing Stevens, Arcadia, DeSales, and Haverford (all games where they either lost or tied).  They replace all of these with Manhattanville, Elmira, Ithaca (both in Ithaca), Muhlenberg, Hunter, Swarthmore, and Neumann.  Plus, they replace departed New Jersey City (merging with Kean) with new NJAC member SUNY New Paltz.  Probably a slight schedule upgrade overall for a team that returns all but one of its regular starters, many of whom were only freshman last season and should be ready to take a step forward with a spring season and off-season under their belt.

Virginia Wesleyan

After a strong 12-6-1 season in which Virginia Wesleyan beat both Christopher Newport and Mary Washington, tied Dickinson, and narrowly lost games to Lynchburg and Hampden-Sydney by one goal each, the team is likely looking to take the next step this season and better compete in conference and the conference tourney.  They do open with a very friendly non-conference schedule, playing 6 straight home games before their first ODAC game.  The only non-conference opponents returning from last season are Christopher Newport and Rutgers-Camden, and they add Kean. Moravian, William Paterson, North Carolina Wesleyan, and Mount Union (@SimpleCoach vacation in Virginia Beach?).  They lose some key senior starters, including leading scorer Zach Bittler, so they'll have to find some scoring.

[SierraFD3soccer]

https://godiplomats.com/sports/mens-soccer/schedule/2026 

F&M added Vassar at home on the first weekend on Sunday. Friday will be W&L as well.  Up to 16 teams. Still room to add one more, maybe?? Not as hard of a schedule from last year, but will be challenging for the remnants.

FYI, F&M apparently will have at 15 freshmen this year with 20 players returning (assuming that they all come back). From time to time, F&M sheds some players who want to do something else much like any team.  Definitely a coaching challenge.