Ohio Athletic Conference (OAC)-(NCAA Division III)
Overview: Since the start of the 1990 season, no college football program at any level in the U.S. has been as dominant as the University of Mount Union Purple Raiders. In fact, in the last decade alone, Mount Union has had only one season where they've lost at least two games in a single season, and that was 12-2 overall in 2016. Of course, no one that's reading this post needs to be reminded of all of the NCAA Division III national championships that the Purple Raiders have won since 1993: 13 of them, to be exact.
The then-defending national champions from Alliance, Ohio came very close to claiming the program's 14th national championship to close the 2018 season. However, another team in purple in the form of the University of Mary Hardin-Baylor Crusaders derailed those plans, as the Purple Raiders fell 24-16 to finish the year at 14-1 overall. Prior to that loss, Mount Union's last loss came to that same Mary Hardin-Baylor squad in the 2016 national semifinals.
Having said that, expect Mount Union to get strong challenges from challengers like John Carroll, whose Blue Streaks were upset by Randolph-Macon in the first round of the NCAA Division III playoffs to finish at 9-2 overall last fall, a Baldwin-Wallace squad that fell just short of postseason play after finishing 8-2, and a Marietta program that's coming off back-to-back winning seasons for the first time since the mid-1990's at 7-3 in 2018. In other words, don't be surprised if one of these aforementioned programs becomes the second team other than the Purple Raiders to claim the automatic bid to the D-III playoffs in a four-year span in 2019.
2018 Ohio Athletic Conference Football Final Standings
2019 Schedules (Teams listed in alphabetical order, click the links below to access to find the schedules)
NOTE: If the link to the team's schedule is not highlighted, it means that the team has not submitted its schedule for the 2019 season. When the team's schedule is submitted, the link (s) will appear in each blog post. Also, please visit the RFC blog at realfootballcentral.blogspot.com for schedules, schedule updates, preseason previews, and much more.
Baldwin-Wallace
Capital
Heidelberg
John Carroll
Marietta
Mount Union
Muskingum
Ohio Northern
Otterbein
Wilmington
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