COVID Extra Year of Eligibility

[Daytripper]

I have been thinking about the impact that granting student athletes an extra year of eligibility because of COVID will have on FCS. https://www.ncsasports.org/coronavirus-sports/ncaa-eligibility-coronavirus I think it will help FCS teams recruit better talent. For every FBS player that takes advantage of the extra year, that is one less spot available to a freshman FBS talent level player. That means that those players will have to "settle" for FCS teams, increasing the overall talent level at this level. Of course this will benefit DII as well because players that would have likely landed at an FCS school will have their place taken by an FBS player that dropped down.

[FUBeAR]

I have been thinking about the impact that granting student athletes an extra year of eligibility because of COVID will have on FCS. https://www.ncsasports.org/coronavirus-sports/ncaa-eligibility-coronavirus I think it will help FCS teams recruit better talent. For every FBS player that takes advantage of the extra year, that is one less spot available to a freshman FBS talent level player. That means that those players will have to "settle" for FCS teams, increasing the overall talent level at this level. Of course this will benefit DII as well because players that would have likely landed at an FCS school will have their place taken by an FBS player that dropped down.Not exactly - I believe the NCAA is also granting a 1 year waiver on the 85/63 scholarship limit. The signing class limit is still in place though. So, there will be some impact for several years as schools work their roster sizes back down, but the 1 year waiver minimizes that & spreads it out.

[Daytripper]

Not exactly - I believe the NCAA is also granting a 1 year waiver on the 85/63 scholarship limit. The signing class limit is still in place though. So, there will be some impact for several years as schools work their roster sizes back down, but the 1 year waiver minimizes that & spreads it out.

Interesting. Thanks for the clarification.

[Professor Chaos]

I think the level of competition will be better immediately in 2021/2022 with the extra year of eligibility for everyone and the increased scholarship limit. Down the road there may be a reverse impact when we hit the 2025 timeframe or so. I've noticed following NDSU's recruiting this summer/fall is that they appear to be recruiting less scholarship players than normal given the size of their fall 2020 senior class and more recruited walk-ons. I'm guessing they're trying to account for the fact that they'll have some 6th year seniors coming back in fall 2021 and don't want to leave them hanging when it comes to renewing their scholarships. Who knows if they'll be able to renew the scholarships for all the players who want to return but I get the feeling that many potential 6th year seniors in 2021 will need to decide whether to call it quits on college football or pay their own way for school.

If that is the case it's kind of a raw deal for high school senior recruits this year... less scholarship money available for them.

[PaladinNation]

When I look at my school Furman I'm interested to see how this plays out.

Furman has a very small group of redshirt seniors (4 - 2 are starters) a much larger group of four-year seniors (9) with tailback Devin Wynn leading that group.
The big question about the senior class is will Devin Wynn play in both 2021 seasons?

How has this impacted recruiting for 2021? Furman just picked up its 12th commitment. From what I'm hearing and a guess Furman has adjusted their recruiting a little and might only bring in one more scholarship player for 2021 and ramp up PWO offers and bringing in a larger group of those preferred walk-ons.

Recruiting against FBS schools. Nine of Furman's commits have FBS offers, one has seven oddly his first offer was App St. Furman has had one de-commit within the last month Jayson Gilliom he committed to Kansas after a late offer. On the flip side Furman's most recent pickup Amaah Achina, was offered by East Carolina way back in April got an offer from Furman on the 18th and committed on the 20th.

I thought I was seeing a pattern with this year's recruiting now I'm not so sure. In Furman's case commits with early FBS offers who don't commit right away then commit to Furman are holding firm. Players like Gilliom who had over 20 + FCS offers decommitted the minute he received an FBS offer.

It's going to be interesting to see what effects the combo season of 2021 and the opportunity to gain an extra season of eligibility play out. for FCS schools

[walliver]

The Fall 2021 season will have a "free agency" look to it with tons of graduate transfers moving around. This will mostly be at the top levels but will filter down to the G5 and FCS.

I doubt Wofford has any 6 year seniors as they will have all graduated by then. A few 5th year seniors may stay around, but we have lost a few of these to P5 programs over the last few years.

I suspect it will be 2022, if not 2023, before college football normalizes.