NJCU athletics composite photo

About a year ago, Kean University announced its intention to take over its norther New Jersey neighbor, New Jersey City University in a merger of the institutions. Left up in the air was the fate of the NJCU athletics teams -- and now, all but one Gothic Knights team has had its fate determined.

All NCAA Division III sports on the New Jersey City campus will be eliminated at the end of the 2025-26 academic year.

As of now, only the men's basketball team will remain as an NJCU athletic team, pending the school's application to compete in a non-NCAA association. 

NJCU's women's cross country student athletes, as well as their team members in the sports of men's and women's outdoor track and field, men's and women's wrestling, and eSports, will be automatically accepted onto teams at Kean. Student-athletes on the men's and somen's soccer teams, men's and women's volleyball teams, the women's basketball team and the softball team will have to try out in order to compete at Kean.

Kean also offers the following sports which are not offered at NJCU: field hockey, flag football, football, golf, lacrosse, women's tennis and women's swimming.

The merger is between programs which finished fifth (Kean) and ninth (NJCU) of the 10 full members of the New Jersey Athletic Conference in 2024-25. Kean and NJCU finished sixth and ninth in 2023-24 and fifth and seventh in 2022-23.

More information is available in the merger FAQ on Kean's website.