Although it is not too far from New York, Ohio State University has a nice zoology program. Even more importantly, OSU has a very nice research budget in practically every field. There are many professors on staff that do a large amount of work with herps. A drawback is the size of the university (50,000 students at the Columbus campus,) meaning that if you do not make the effort to work with certain professors, you won't ever be noticed. Worth looking into.