The NCAA Division II Football Playoffs field has been announced and two HBCU schools — one from the CIAA, one from the SIAC — will be going to the NCAA playoffs.
Miles College, the newly crowned SIAC champions, received the no. 4 slot in the NCAA Super Region II and will host Carson Newman.
Virginia Union, the newly crowned CIAA champions, will travel to Wingate University in North Carolina.
Miles College went 9-2 en rout to the SIAC Championship, winning nine consecutive games after an 0-2 start. It will be looking for its NCAA Playoff first win in school history on Saturday.
VUU went 8-3 overall this season — 8-2 against Division II competition. The game against Wingate is a rematch of the 2022 playoff game that was hosted in Richmond. Virginia Union has made the NCAA Division II playoffs for the third consecutive season.
HBCU teams on the outside-looking-in at the playoffs include Johnson C. Smith and Winston-Salem State.
Johnson C. Smith went 8-2 during the 2024 season and was thought to have a solid shot at a bid into the playoffs. That win total is the best in school history as the team got off to an 8-0 start with a win over Winston-Salem State on Oct. 26. JCSU appeared to have the inside track on a CIAA championship game bid, but it lost its final two games to Fayetteville State and Livingstone College to find itself watching two schools — Virginia Union and Virginia State — that it had beaten. Those three wins against VUU, VSU and WSSU were not enough to overcome their losses, however.
WSSU finished the season 7-3 overall, 7-2 against Division II competition. It was ranked in the regional rankings throughout the month of November, but did not make the field.