Does adding football help colleges with recruiting? It's complicated

Roanoke College resumed varsity football for the first time since 1942, beginning practice amid visible enthusiasm and training drills. The college is among about a dozen schools that added football programs recently, with more planning launches in 2026. Administrators expect a team and related campus activities to raise enrollment, especially attracting male students, after the college lost nearly 300 students from 2019 to 2022. Nationally, women outnumber men roughly 60/40 at four-year colleges, and the population of 18-year-olds is projected to decline. Research, however, shows enrollment often spikes initially after adding football but usually does not sustain long-term gains.

""On a hot and humid August morning in this southwestern Virginia town, football training camp is in full swing at Roanoke College. Players cheer as a receiver makes a leaping one-handed catch, and linemen sweat through blocking drills. Practice hums along like a well-oiled machine yet this is the first day this team has practiced, ever. In fact, it's the first day of practice for a Roanoke College varsity football team since 1942, when the college dropped football in the midst of World War II.""

""Roanoke is one of about a dozen schools that have added football programs in the last two years, with several more set to do so in 2026. Administrators hope that having a team will increase enrollment, especially of men, whose ranks in college have been falling. Yet research consistently finds that while enrollment may spike initially, adding football does not produce long-term enrollment gains.""

""Do I think adding sports strategically is helping the college maintain its enrollment base? It absolutely has for us," said Shushok. "And it has in a time when men in particular aren't going to college.""

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