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No, technically the NESCAC season ends before they play everyone in the conference. There are 11 schools in NESCAC, but ConnColl doesn’t play football, so there are 10 football teams. That means every team would need to play 9 games to play every other team. But NESCAC has the shortest football season in the NCAA – only 8 games. So a given team will play most of the other teams in the conference (except one), and then the season ends. </p>
<p>NESCAC declares a league champion (or champions) based on the 8-game regular season. There are also informal but longstanding “Little Three” (Williams, Amherst, Wesleyan) and “CBB” (Colby, Bates, Bowdoin) championships.</p>
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NESCAC has voluntarily adopted the most severe football restrictions in the NCAA. These include the shortest regular season (only 8 games), no interleague play (which obviously makes it hard to rank NESCAC teams relative to the rest of DIII), and a flat ban on post-season play. In addition, of course, NESCAC has high academic standards for football players.</p>
<p>NESCAC feels that football is an unusually demanding non-academic commitment, and that a preseason plus 8-week regular season is long enough. For comparison, other DIII teams play a preseason, a 10-week regular season, and then up to 5 more weeks in the playoffs. The two teams that reach the DIII national championship play 15 games over the season, which is almost twice the length of the NESCAC schedule.</p>
<p>The Ivy League has similar restrictions, including a shortened regular season relative to other FCS schools (10 games), limited interleague play (only with the Patriot League), and a ban on post-season play. The Ivy League declines to play in the NCAA FCS or in bowl games, just as NESCAC declines the NCAA DIII playoffs.</p>