VILLANOVA, Pa.—For the second straight season and the third time in the last four years, the Villanova football team is headed to the FCS playoffs. The field of 24 teams for the Division I Football Championship was announced Sunday afternoon live on ESPNU and the Wildcats earned the #11 seed in the tournament bracket. Villanova (9-3) will host a first round game against Eastern Kentucky (8-4) from the United Athletic Conference. Both teams are at-large selections and they will play each other for the first time ever on Saturday, November 30 at Villanova Stadium. Kickoff is slated for 2 p.m. and the game will be broadcast live on ESPN+.
 
Head coach Mark Ferrante and the Wildcats are no strangers to the FCS playoff field. This is the 16^th time since 1989 that Villanova is headed to the postseason, and the first time since 2009 and 2010 that the Wildcats are making consecutive playoff appearances. Ferrante is taking Villanova to the postseason for the fourth time as a head coach. He was previously a longtime assistant on the Wildcats staff and has been a part of all 16 playoff appearances since the program became an FCS member in 1985. Villanova owns an all-time record of 14-14 in the playoffs, including a quarterfinal berth last season when the team as the #8 national seed.
 
This year's edition of the Wildcats closed out the regular season with a rousing 38-28 win over Delaware in the final game of the "Battle of the Blue" rivalry series. Villanova won nine regular season games for the third time in the last four seasons and lost just twice in a daunting CAA Football slate. Along the way, the Wildcats extended their home winning streak to 15 straight games dating back to 2022 and went undefeated against FCS non-conference opponents for the eighth straight time in regular season play.
 
Villanova's strength all season has been the play of its defense, which ranks second in CAA Football in both scoring defense (18.8 points allowed per game) and fewest passing yards allowed (178.7 per game). The defense held three regular season opponents (Colgate, New Hampshire, North Carolina A&T) without a touchdown and gave up just 14.7 points per game in its six conference victories. One of those wins came against a New Hampshire team which tied for third place in the standings with Villanova and is also headed to the playoffs as the #16 national seed.
 
As steady as the defense has been all year, the Wildcats have had a resurgent offense in the past two weeks and have scored 71 points against Monmouth (40-33 loss) and Delaware. In Saturday's win over the Blue Hens, fifth year linebacker Brendan Bell (Basking Ridge, N.J.) is believed to be the first player in Villanova's FCS era to score both an offensive touchdown and a defensive touchdown in the same game. He had a pick-six in the first quarter and helped seal the game with a six-yard rushing touchdown in the final period.
 
Next week's first round matchup pits the Wildcats against the Colonels, a member of the United Athletic Conference which produced three playoff teams this season. Eastern Kentucky defeated fellow playoff squad and #13 national seed Tarleton State when the Texans were ranked seventh in the country. The Colonels also defeated then-No. 16 Central Arkansas and lost a close game on the road to conference champion and #15 national seed Abilene Christian.
 
Eastern Kentucky averages 22.8 points per game offensively and allows 23.8 points per contest, although the latter figure drops to 19.9 points allowed per game when removing FBS losses to Mississippi State and Western Kentucky. The Colonels feature a 1,000 yard rusher in redshirt senior running back Joshua Carter who has run for 1,028 yards and 13 touchdowns on the year.