Like any good football game, an attempt to get a football team in the Ontario University Athletics (OUA) by fall of 2012 will come down to the wire for Carleton University.

The group attempting to revive the currently defunct Carleton Ravens football team needs to raise $5 million to cover the team’s first five years of operations. These funds would cover an $800,000 annual operating cost and $200,000 in capital, to be put towards infrastructure improvements such as weight rooms and dressing rooms, per year.

“We’re somewhere between $4.2 and $4.3 million in secured donations and pledges, and a number of donors in the works, so we’re still pushing hard there,” said Kevin McKerrow, president of the Old Crow Society — a group of Carleton football alumni.

The Ravens football initiative must have their application submitted to the OUA by May 1 in order to be eligible to take the field in 2012.

Despite the looming deadline, however, McKerrow said he believes the group is still on track to successfully submit their application.

“We’re getting closer,” said McKerrow, a former Ravens football player himself. “I don’t expect that we’ll have everything tied up much sooner than [May]. We’re progressing.”

The previous incarnation of the Carleton Ravens football team was forced to fold in 1998, following several poor seasons and a withdrawal of funding from the football program by the Carleton athletics department.

However, this movement to revive the team has much more optimism attached to it than the team that folded, which endured two consecutive 1-7 regular season records before finally being shut down.

“From early on, it became much more than just a fundraising goal. It was about being able to be involved in developing the program and overseeing the program,” said McKerrow about the process of forming the team once more. “The business model we’ve arrived at will ensure that we, the Old Crows, and supporters of football in the community will have an influence on the product and the program itself going forward.”

Despite this optimism, McKerrow suggests there is still much work to do. The sub-committee met March 28 to design plans for the facilities, including team and coach dressing rooms. The team must also hire a coach.

“We have had a number of coaches express interest in the Ravens job, but I wouldn’t identify anyone as a frontrunner,” McKerrow said. “We still intend to go forward with a nationwide recruitment and process for hiring a coach.”