There’s some pressure to avoid an early stumble in this spring football campaign, and Colonial Athletic Association coaches can understand why.

“We’re playing a real formidable opponent the first game,” longtime New Hampshire coach Sean McDonnell said. “And it feels a little bit like a playoff game to be honest with you.”

McDonnell’s 14th-ranked Wildcats host No. 13 Albany on Friday to kick off the conference schedule. UNH and Albany are two of five CAA programs in the Stats Perform FCS Top 25 this week, along with No. 1 James Madison, No. 5 Villanova and No. 25 Delaware.

Beyond those programs, there are others like Maine and Stony Brook – each boasting enough talent and maintaining enough depth – to compete for a spot in the postseason.

The dilemma is, with a condensed schedule and fewer at-large berths into the playoffs available, that reaching the postseason this year is more difficult than ever before.

“I would assume whoever wins the league [gets into the playoffs],” Stony Brook coach Chuck Priore said. “And I would assume our second-place team will go unless everybody is 3-3. After that, I don’t know.”

Most CAA teams are only playing six conference games scheduled by the league. JMU and Elon each added two non-league contests played over the past two weeks. The Dukes went 2-0 with wins over Morehead State and Robert Morris, and the Phoenix split games with Davidson and Gardner-Webb.

So aside from the additional data for JMU and Elon, resumes for CAA teams at the end of the regular season will feature just exactly what happened in conference action.

“I think [of] any time that you can sit here and talk about the game that you’re playing is the most important one, it’s this year,” McDonnell said. “There’s only six of ‘em, so getting out of the gate strong is important, finishing strong is important and all of those things, but the next [game] is important.”

The FCS playoff bracket will include only 16 teams instead of the usual 24, with 10 conference winners automatically qualifying and only six at-large bids to hand out instead of the normal 14. That means, for every program with aspirations of reaching the postseason, the margin for error is also smaller.

This past Saturday’s results nationally, proved that, too.

North Dakota State, winners of the last three FCS national championships, suffered a setback to Southern Illinois and now the Bison – assuming they don’t win the Missouri Valley Football Conference – are likely one loss away from sitting on the bubble for a spot in the playoffs and another from being eliminated from postseason contention.

In addition to NDSU, ten other teams in last week’s FCS Top 25 were beaten, further showing how competitive landing one of those at-large spots could be.

“When you look at the scores from around the FCS world this past weekend, I guess there are some scores that are of note,” Villanova coach Mark Ferrante said. “But our whole mentality ever since I’ve been head coach – and it’s not going to change whether we play an 11-game or 12-game schedule or in this case a six-game schedule – is we’re just trying to get to 1-0 each week. And that’s been the mentality we’ve always taken in the past and now especially this year.”

Games have more weight this spring than they do during a full fall schedule when a 24-team postseason bracket waiting, and most coaches are echoing that of the approach of McDonnell and Ferrante.

Villanova and Stony Brook open against each other on Saturday on Long Island to continue the first weekend of CAA play. Maine and Delaware will play in Newark, Del., while rivals Richmond and William & Mary meet at Robins Stadium in Richmond. The Dukes go to Elon.

“To me, it’s not a whole lot different,” JMU coach Curt Cignetti said, “because every game is the most important game and you’ve got to take care of business every week and have a great week of preparation. So, our guys know what they have to do to get what they want and how we have to commit and work every single day to give ourselves the best chance [of reaching the postseason]. So, we’re more process oriented in terms of what we have to do today and so our approach really doesn’t change.”

Said Priore: “Every team in this league that’s competing right now, wants to be in the playoffs. I’ve always felt that the best teams that we’ve had always focused on the little things and didn’t worry about the end product, and you’re going to have a slip up. This league is a competitive league, so you’re going to have a slip up and it’s when you can get over that slip up that you can really call yourself a real good football team.”