Four New York schools will play this weekend in the opening round of the NCAA Division III football playoffs.

Alfred State, Cortland, Ithaca and Union made the 32-team field Sunday, with each team drawing a road game in the first round. All four games start at noon Saturday.

Of all the draws, Alfred State drew the toughest. The 6-4 Pioneers, in their first-ever playoff appearance after winning the Eastern Collegiate Football Conference, will travel to 10-0 Mount Union (Ohio), the No. 2 team in the D3Football.com Top 25 and national runner-up a year ago. The Purple Raiders program has won 13 Division III national championships and won the Ohio Athletic Conference championship this season.

Cortland (9-1), ranked No. 11 in the latest Top 25 and Empire 8 champions, will travel to Endicott (Mass.). The Gulls (9-1) won the Commonwealth Coast Conference — but their only loss of the season came to Ithaca, who Cortland beat Saturday for the Cortaca Jug. The Red Dragons have won seven in a row, their only loss coming to Susquehanna in mid-September.

Ithaca, meanwhile, had already secured a playoff berth before the Cortaca Jug loss, by virtue of winning the Liberty League championship. The 8-2 Bombers — whose regular-season losses were to fellow D-III playoff teams Cortland and Johns Hopkins (Md.) — will travel to Springfield (Mass.). The 9-1 Pride, NEWMAC champions, steamrolled through their conference schedule, and were only held under 21 points in a game once, falling 34-7 to Union in September.

Union (9-1) is coming off a Dutchman Shoes rivalry win over RPI, and lost just once this season, to Ithaca. Union secured a Pool C, or wild-card, bid to the playoffs. The Garnet Chargers defense is only giving up an average of a little more than 7 points per game, but will be tested Saturday by Mid-Atlantic Conference champ Delaware Valley (Pa.) The 9-1 Aggies lost at Cortland in their season opener and haven't looked back since, with a defense just as stifling as Union's (7.1 points allowed per game to Union's 7.4).

North Central (Ill.), the defending national champion, is the top team in this year's bracket, having gone unbeaten and repeating as College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin champion. The Cardinals have played in three consecutive Stagg Bowls, winning two.