Lehigh Mountain Hawks

Lehigh to face competitive 2018 schedule

Published Mar. 9, 2018 3:18 p.m. ET

(STATS) - Lehigh hopes to turn a strong non-conference schedule into its third straight Patriot League title.

The Mountain Hawks announced an 11-game schedule on Friday, including a trip to Navy for their first game against an FBS opponent since 2003.

It starts with two home games at Goodman Stadium against Saint Francis (Sept. 1) and Villanova (Sept. 8).

"It's important for us to have the opportunity to play our first two games at home," said coach Andy Coen, who begins his 13th season. "We need to play better at the beginning of our schedule, which is something that we didn't do a very good job of last year. It's very important for us to start stronger than we have in the past couple years."

The Mountain Hawks will then head to the road to take on Navy for the first time since 1987. They haven't played an FBS opponent since a 35-17 loss at Connecticut in 2003.

Lehigh will close out the non-conference portion of the schedule with two more road games - Penn (Sept. 22) and Princeton (Oct. 6).

From there, the Mountain Hawks will play only Patriot League opponents, hosting Fordham (Oct. 13), Bucknell (Nov. 3) and 2017 co-champ Colgate (Nov. 10). They'll travel to Georgetown (Oct. 20), Holy Cross (Oct. 27) and rival Lafayette (Nov. 17) for the 154th meeting of college football's most-played rivalry.

Lehigh overcame an 0-5 start last season to advance to the FCS playoffs for a second consecutive season. It finished 5-7.

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2018 Lehigh Schedule

Sept. 1, Saint Francis

Sept. 8, Villanova

Sept. 15, at Navy

Sept. 22, at Penn

Oct. 6, at Princeton

Oct. 13, Fordham*

Oct. 20, at Georgetown*

Oct. 27, at Holy Cross*

Nov. 3, Bucknell*