Maroons

Salem, Virginia sits in the Roanoke Valley. Roanoke College itself dates to 1842, when it opened as the Virginia Institute before taking its present name eleven years later, but the football program came later still, taking the field for the first time in 1892 against Allegheny Institute. It lasted half a century before the war ended it: the Maroons closed out the 1942 season with a 42–0 loss to Catawba College and did not play again.

The gap ran 82 years. Students revived the sport as a club team in 2024, and by 2025 the college had restored it to full varsity status inside the Old Dominion Athletic Conference, with the first ODAC win of the new era coming that same season.

Maroon and gray remain the colours, and the sideline mascot is Rooney, a hawk with a maroon tail. Washington and Lee carries the weight of the main rivalry, with Hampden-Sydney, Randolph-Macon and Bridgewater also on the schedule. The Maroons have no conference or national titles to point to; a program picking up after 82 years away is still writing its first chapters, not counting them.

Salem Stadium holds 7,157.