At last, the Ivy League is back, with its FCS-latest opening day coming on Saturday. The Ancient Eight are set to showcase a familiar title hunt led by perennial powers Harvard and Yale, but the parity in the conference ensures plenty of landmines for the favorites.
Harvard went 8-2 overall in 2023, including a Senior Day, championship-clinching, triple-overtime win over Penn. The next week, the Crimson fell to Yale 23-18 in The Game, getting the Bulldogs their share of the Ivy championship and embodying the weekly thrills of late-season Ivy ball.
November in the Ivy League, of course, carries special significance as the conference holds out from the FCS playoffs and its would-be auto-bid to the dance. The league title is the ultimate, and really sole, crown for these historic rivals, the majority of which see more transfers out than in – yet the programs’ depth in the upper echelon of the league almost guarantees a photo finish.
New Customer Offers at BetMGM
Bonus Bets Expire in 7 Days. One New Customer Offer Only. Add’l Terms
Preseason All-Americans
Brown (1) – DB Isaiah Reed (2nd Team)
Penn (1) – WR Jared Richardson (2nd Team)
Names To Know
TOP OFFENSIVE PLAYER: Jared Richardson, Penn WR — Richardson lit it up last year, breaking out for the Quakers with team highs in receptions (67), receiving yards (788), and receiving touchdowns (8). In order for Penn to crack the ceiling formed by Harvard, Yale, Dartmouth, and Princeton atop the Ivy, the Quakers will have to score at a rate even better than last season’s 26.2 PPG. Richardson, a 6-2, 215-pound junior, will have a large hand in that – though it will be intriguing to see defenses give him extra attention after his 2023 turned heads.
TOP DEFENSIVE PLAYER: Isaiah Reed, Brown DB — Reed, in fairness, has a great argument to occupy his teammate’s slot as a top NFL prospect (below). The 6-0, 185-pound ballhawk led the Ivy League in interceptions a year ago with five. All five picks came against Ivy opponents that finished ahead of Brown in the standings. Reed is all over the place on the national radar, appearing on the Reese’s Senior Bowl watch list this preseason in addition to the Buck Buchanan Award watch list and a 2025 East-West Shrine Bowl 1000 selection. Reed’s Brown defense will need his takeaways to get off the field if last year’s 30.1 PPG allowed in Ivy action doesn’t improve.
TOP NFL PROSPECT: Jake Willcox, Brown QB — Willcox is guided by Bears quarterbacks coach Heather Marini, the first female position coach in Division I history who remains the only female position coach in DI in 2024. Willcox’s play adds to that great story. The fifth-year QB has ascended since first getting starts in 2022. A year ago, Willcox led the Ivy League with 2,924 passing yards and concluded second in the Ivy with 18 touchdown passes. He was asked to sling it as a senior, wrapping up at 292.4 passing yards per game to go with 28.5 completions per game. The former figure made Willcox the top returning FCS passer per game entering this fall. With another productive year, it’s possible that the Everett, Massachusetts native follows the footsteps of fellow Brown QB (turned NFL practice squad member) EJ Perry.
HERO Sports’ Predicted Order of Finish
- Harvard
- Penn
- Yale
- Princeton
- Dartmouth
- Brown
- Columbia
- Cornell
The Ivy League has long been something of a unicorn in the FCS (let alone its academic prestige), as its slightly shorter regular season tradition throws national fans off its calendar to an extent. Some of these fans might discount the Ivy for its postseason choice, but the conference is also a one-score-game factory at times, producing ample excitement with some of the subdivision’s legendary brands. All battle for similar recruits in similar areas.
One storied brand, Harvard, returns a great deal of production to make a run. The Crimson are experienced with top QBs Charles DePrima and Jaden Craig back in the fold. That’s not to mention the return of Shane McLaughlin, the 2023 Ivy League rushing leader with 830 yards on 155 attempts. Top wide receiver Cooper Barkate adds to the list of reliable faces for first-year Harvard head coach Andrew Aurich. Former head coach Tim Murphy retired in January after three decades steering the Crimson. Murphy left Aurich a good situation in Cambridge, albeit with the obvious big shoes to fill following that longevity.
It’s also a situation with high competition for first place this season. Penn brings back quarterback Aidan Sayin as a senior. His 279.1 passing yards per game were fifth in the FCS last season. Yale, meanwhile, has to be one of the premier preseason No. 3s in any FCS conference. The Bulldogs are coming off the Nolan Grooms era at QB, but they maintain numerous all-conference types in 2022 Ivy League Rookie of the Year RB Josh Pitsenberger, 6-4 tight end Ry Yates, and defensive lineman Dylan Yang.
One of the more remarkable parts of the Ivy League order is that Princeton, Dartmouth, and Brown create a rock-solid tier in the middle. Only one of these three teams can find the top half of the projection here, though, and Princeton is trustworthy under Bob Surace. Even in a down year (by the Tigers’ standards) a year ago at 5-5, there were wins over Harvard and Penn alongside one-score losses to Lafayette, Brown, Dartmouth, and Yale.
It’s worth noting that the Ivy’s start this week means that we will begin to see some more interesting nonconference meetings trickling in in the northeast. These involve Ivy programs unafraid of testing matchups that would hypothetically make for nice playoff games regionally:
Week 1 – Yale at Holy Cross, Penn at (FBS-transitioning) Delaware
Week 3 – New Hampshire at Harvard, UAlbany at Cornell
Week 4 – Brown at Rhode Island, Princeton at Mercer
