Richmond Times-Dispatch reporter, John O’Conner reporting that URI will join the NEC in 2012.

According to O’Conner, URI would leave for the NEC, which get’s an automatic playoff bid next season. URI has struggled for sometime in the CAA and A10 before that. The move would put them in a better regional footprint for football, a lower level of competition, and a better chance to make the playoffs.

The CAA has lost two football programs this past year. Northeastern dropped football after ironically being the very reason they were brought into the CAA in the first place a few years back. The CAA had 5 football playing members and needed a 6th in order to usurp  football sponsorship from the A10. After Northeastern dropped football, Hofstra, another northeast located school, dropped the sport as well.

If URI leaves the CAA, it would be the 3rd school from the region to depart. The CAA is currently set to be a 12 team football conferences with the additions of ODU and Georgia St. Football members who are not all-sports CAA schools include URI, UMass, UNH, Maine, Richmond and Villanova.

If URI did indeed join the NEC, they would be the 10 member. Current NEC football members include Central Connecticut State, Albany, Wagner, Robert Morris, Bryant, Monmouth, Duquesne, Sacred Heart and St. Francis.

There had been rumblings about other northeast schools Maine and UNH considering other options than the CAA due to costs. But the NEC remains the only option, and both schools would prefer a stronger conference that included regional rival UMass, which is also in the CAA.