Hartford Hawks The Hartford Hawks are the youngest of the NEFC teams, being founded in 1922. They have been a middle of the pack team over their history but won a couple of championships while the Independents were not a part of the NEFC. The Hawks only recently got their nickname “Hawks”. Before 1945 they were known as the Hartford Maroons, which the new owner wasn’t a fan of and decided to change the team to the Hawks as a “cooler” mascot. They play out of Arnold H. Benson Park near Downtown Hartford but it is one of the smaller stadiums at only 23,400 and one of the oldest opening in 1906.
The owner of the Hawks is Jonathan Sampson. Sampson took over the team in 1945 reviving it after the war. He was no fan of the former name of the “Maroons”, so he had changed it to the “Hawks”. Sampson also enters the NAAF as the youngest owner currently only 35. He has had a couple of years of experience with the team but before taking ownership in ‘45 he was a simple businessman looking for a new opportunity.
The Hawks enter the first season being mostly cast aside as the other team from New England. They have been playing third fiddle to the Providence Gold Stars and Boston Independents for years now and no one expects them to get close to the playoffs. While the team sports an okay veteran QB in Oliver Callahan and a star WR John Rivera, they lack a strong offensive line and run game. Their defence is one of the worst in the league. They have few difference makers and the only notable players are DB Michael Connor and DL George Woods. Head Coach Jerry Moore is one of the more conservative coaches in the league. He brings a strategic style to the team that usually plays to its strengths but may have trouble if the main strategy is taken away.
1949-1952
1953
Flying South, The Hawks Cross Long Island Sound to Find Their New Home
The Hawks have found a new owner, in a surprise buy from former Long Island Raiders owner, Wayne Tillman. Tillman was a longtime owner for the Long Island team in the NYFL, but after the league shut his team down following the 1951 season, Tillman has been looking for another opportunity to take on a new team. Tillman has voiced his displeasure over the handling of the NYFL and ACFL merger and how his team was thrown under the bus. While the Long Island Raiders were never a huge success, they still had a good following with a brand new stadium that had opened for the 1951 season.
The NYFL has gained a bad reputation in their league management. The Buffalo Blue Wings used to play in the league and had been ignored with the other New York teams not wanting to travel to Buffalo, Rochester, and Syracuse each year, so Buffalo rarely had home games, which would eventually happen to the other upstate New York teams. In this case, the richest teams in New York and Brooklyn always got their way in order to keep the league afloat with their funding. That meant that with the merger, the teams wanted to hold a greater area of the market and shut down the other teams. The move would backfire with many fans upset over the loss of their teams and another factor they didn’t think about: NAAF on CBS.
Since CBS was covering the NAAF in the summer, it gave fans a chance to see a different league and they wouldn’t have to support the NY teams. They would still go back to them a bit come the fall. However, the movement of the Hawks to Long Island might turn the tables. The fans of Long Island are very likely to gravitate to the new team in their area and in a league that people have started to take notice of.
With the purchase coming later in the offseason, the team will maintain the Hawks brand and jerseys for this season but will now be known as the Long Island Hawks. They will be playing in Long Island Stadium, which hosts 40,450 and is located in Hempstead, New York. Tillman is very excited to bring the new style of football to Long Island. Already is much more satisfied with the way things are handled and managed in the NAAF and assures the fans of the team that they are in good hands.
Several days after the purchase with limited time before the draft, Wayne Tillman fired almost his entire staff. GM Michael Stein would be let go with Tillman taking over the GM role, HC Willie McLean would be dumped to the street with OC Dean Parrish. DC Jimmy Sargent would be promoted to HC as he used to be the DC for the Raiders. After the team shut down he had gone to Hartford and spent the last season with the team. That makes him the most experienced in NAAF football, but also he was expected to eventually become the HC of the Raiders at some point. The OC is also a former Raiders OC, Richard Thorne. He is a very experienced coach and should help the dire offense regroup. The new DC is a young college coach in George Mitchell, this will be his first professional coaching role, but he has lots of potential as a long term staff member.
The alternate will now be the primary logo for the time being getting rid of the "Hartford" wordmark and going with a barebones wordmark. No changes to the jerseys, but they expect that will change come next season.
1954
Introducing the Long Island Raiders
Owner Wayne Tillman was extremely excited to announce the team would be returning to the old "Raiders" name. The Raiders had been a long time name of the Long Island team and the roots and history dig deep into the area already. “It felt right, the people here know the Raiders and they want to see their team return. It was a process to decide, but after hearing feedback from fans, it was clear this was the right direction to go.”
The “Hawks” name was officially dropped after being the name of the Hartford Hawks for only 8 seasons after Jonathan Sampson had decided to rename the Hartford Maroons upon the return of football in 1946. Long Island was not able to rebrand after a quick ownership change and move, but with this season they would be able to put together a new design.
The new logo features two pirate swords crossed over the shape of Long Island with “Long Island Raiders” surrounding the logo. The team dropped silver and returned to green which the original Raiders had used. However, they decided to keep the burgundy rather than going to green and white. Tillman mentioned that he loved the burgundy from the Hawks brand and wanted to incorporate it into the new-look Raiders.
The uniforms look to introduce some new trends with the crossed swords on the helmet, becoming just the 4th team to have a major helmet design, but the first to have a proper logo on the side. They also introduced TV numbers with the increase of broadcasting games. If it is a popular addition to the jerseys the rest of the league may follow suit shortly. As for the overall jersey design, they kept some ideas from the Hawks with the stripping but introduced a more colourful set of uniforms. They move away from the Burgundy jerseys to go with the dark green, but also make the helmets burgundy.
1955-1957
1958-Present
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