NCAA Division I Football Championship Subdivision

NCAA Division I Football
Championship Subdivision (FCS)
Current season, competition or edition:
2025 NCAA Division I FCS football season
SportAmerican football
Founded1978
First season1978; 48 years ago
Organizing bodyNCAA
Division1
No. of teams128
CountryUnited States
Most recent
champion
Montana State
(2025)
Most titlesNorth Dakota State
(10 titles)
Websitencaa.com/football/fcs

The NCAA Division I Football Championship Subdivision (FCS), formerly known as Division I-AA, is the second-highest level of college football in the United States, after the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS). Sponsored by the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), the FCS level comprises 129 teams in 13 conferences as of the 2024 season.

History

See also: NCAA Division I Football Championship Subdivision alignment history

From 1906 to 1955, the NCAA had no divisional structure for member schools. Prior to the 1956 college football season, NCAA schools were organized into an upper University Division and lower College Division. In the summer of 1973, the University Division became Division I, but by 1976, there was a desire to further separate the major football programs from those that were less financially successful, while allowing their other sports to compete at the top level.[1]

Division I-AA was created in January 1978, when Division I was subdivided into Division I-A and Division I-AA for football only.[2] The initial criteria for a program's admittance to I-A included (1) scheduling 60% of its games against other I-A teams, and either (2) having a 30,000-seat stadium and an average attendance of 17,000 for one year in the last four, or (3) drawing an average of 17,000 over the last four years. Division I football schools satisfying #1 and either #2 or #3 also had to maintain eight sports overall. Schools failing to meet either #2 or #3 could still qualify for I-A if they maintained twelve sports overall.[3] (NOTE: the NCAA, at the time, governed male sports only; women's teams did not count toward these totals). Of 144 schools participating in Division I football in the 1977 season, 79 were expected to qualify for I-A, with the remaining 65 relegated to I-AA.[3]

But because the NCAA allowed four years for criteria #2 and #3 to be met, just eight schools (seven from the Southwestern Athletic Conference, a league of HBCUs that had just moved to Division I in 1977) opted for Division I-AA for the 1978 season. Meanwhile, another 35 reclassified from Division II to Division I-AA, including four entire conferences. Thus, at least initially, the creation of Division I-AA appeared to backfire; rather than serve as a home for the smaller or less competitive football programs of Division I, it created a pathway for football-playing Division II schools to join Division I without the burden of funding a major football program. Division I-AA still had just 50 members when the four-year deadline set in January 1978 expired, forcing 41 schools that did not meet I-A criteria to reclassify to I-AA.[4] Some successfully appealed the decision, including eight members of the Mid-American Conference along with Cincinnati, a football independent at the time.[5] Thus I-AA membership hit an early peak of 91 in 1982, before settling down into the 80–90 range for the next several years.

The next big increase in Division I-AA membership came after the January 1991 NCAA convention voted to require every athletic program to maintain all of its sports at the same divisional level by the 1993 season.[6] In order to comply, 28 Division I schools with football programs at the Division II and Division III levels were forced to upgrade their teams to the Division I level, and all of them (at least initially) chose Division I-AA as their new football home. At the same time, the number of football scholarships allowed in I-AA was reduced from the original 70 to 63, effective in 1994; it has remained at that number ever since. With the new additions, membership in I-AA hit a new high of 118 in 1993.

The subdivision stabilized thereafter, maintaining at least 120 members from 1997 onward. Membership peaked at 130 in 2022 before settling at the current 129.

NCAA Division I-A and NCAA Division I-AA were renamed as NCAA Division I FBS and NCAA Division I FCS prior to the 2006 season.

Playoff Format

Main article: NCAA Division I Football Championship

The FCS has held a post-season playoff to award an NCAA-sanctioned national championship since its inception in 1978, starting with a 4-team playoff.

The field first expanded to 8 in 1981. This grew to 12 teams the following season. It expanded to 16 in 1986 until 2010 when it grew to 20 teams. As of 2013, the playoff format consists of 24 teams.[7]

The Ivy League began participating in the FCS playoffs in 2025, making their conference champion one of the 11 automatic bids.[8] The rest of the field consists of 13 at-large bids, determined by a playoff committee.[9]

Until 2024, only the Top 8 teams were seeded. This created a scenario where the first round host sites were determined via a bid submitted by each school participating in the playoff. Currently, seeds 9-16 host the remaining unseeded schools based on proximity in the first round. The second round is hosted by the 1-8 seeds. The higher-seeded school hosts the quarterfinals and semifinals.[10]

The championship game is currently played in Nashville, Tennessee at FirstBank Stadium.

Conferences

As of the 2025 football season, there are 13 Division I FCS football conferences:

See also

References

  1. ^ "NCAA may drop 100 Division 1 schools". Deseret News. Salt Lake City, Utah. Associated Press. November 16, 1976. p. B11.
  2. ^ "Big schools win battle". St. Petersburg Independent. Florida. Associated Press. January 13, 1978. p. 5C.
  3. ^ a b Underwood, John (January 23, 1978). "The NCAA splits its decision". Sports Illustrated. Retrieved August 22, 2023.
  4. ^ "The Boston Globe from Boston, Massachusetts on August 28, 1982 · 32".
  5. ^ "The Cincinnati Enquirer from Cincinnati, Ohio on August 27, 1982 · Page 19".
  6. ^ Hiserman, Mike (January 11, 1991). "Northridge Likely To Alter Its Game Plan". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved June 14, 2026 – via Newspapers.com.
  7. ^ NCAA.com Staff (January 14, 2020). "FCS championship: Everything you need to know". NCAA.com. Retrieved June 18, 2026.
  8. ^ Associated Press (December 18, 2024). "Ivy League teams to be eligible for FCS playoffs beginning in 2025". Yahoo Sports. Retrieved June 18, 2026.
  9. ^ Herder, Sam (September 9, 2025). "2025 FCS Playoff Committee Members". HERO Sports. Retrieved June 18, 2026.
  10. ^ Herder, Sam (October 23, 2025). "The FCS New-Look, 16-Seeded Playoff Bracket". HERO Sports. Retrieved June 18, 2026.
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