FCS School Scholarship Limits going away?

[WestCoastAggie]

https://twitter.com/Reddit_FCS/status/1519342656924655616

[DFW HOYA]

This is overblown. There were no caps on scholarships prior to the 1978 split. How many schools were running 125 or 130 below the Top 15?

If you make football a head count sport, it's not like a lot of 63-scholarship schools are suddenly going to add 25, 30, or more grants. Most won't add any.

[FUBeAR]

This is overblown. There were no caps on scholarships prior to the 1978 split. How many schools were running 125 or 130 below the Top 15?

If you make football a head count sport, it's not like a lot of 63-scholarship schools are suddenly going to add 25, 30, or more grants. Most won't add any.
NCAA Football Scholarship limits 1st began in the 1973 Academic Year; the Football Recruiting Class of 1974. The year after Johnny Majors brought in about 100 Recruits at Pitt, including a pretty good RB named Tony Dorsett. Here’s a good article about that class https://archive.triblive.com/news/class-of-73-keyed-pitts-magical-season/

…and here’s a quote from a different article about scholarship limits https://www.aseaofblue.com/2013/6/11/4409982/ncaa-football-a-brief-history-of-ncaa-football-scholarships

The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) was established in 1906 as the Intercollegiate Athletic Association of the United States. The name was changed to its current name in 1910. There was no control over scholarships for any sport, but there was a requirement that a school's athletes had to be enrolled in the school they played for. Football schools could offer as many scholarships as they could afford and many had 150 players or more.

1973 brought about the first limitations on football scholarships in order to free up money for women's sports after Title IX was passed by Congress in 1972 as part of the Equal Opportunity in Education Act. This caused the NCAA schools' presidents and athletic directors to push through a limit of 105 football scholarships. Additional reductions were made in 1978 (95) and again in 1992 which brought the limit to its present number of 85 and 63 for Division I-AA.

Nothing about the abdication of the NCAA can be overblown. No one has any idea how it will all shake out, but College Football, all College Football (not just FCS) could see cataclysmic changes to the current structure and current competitive environment.

FUBeAR’s advice…Hang on tight and enjoy it while you can.

[lionsrking2]

This is overblown.

The opposite is true.

[DFW HOYA]

Thanks for the clarification.

Where I could see this going is, in the absence of widespread consensus that the NCAA acts in a conference's interests, each conference (or group of conferences) will essentially regulate themselves. If the SEC wants paid players and hundreds of scholarships, they'll get it. If the Ivy League wants none, they'll get that, too. Everyone else in the middle will have to align to governing bodies which meet their needs.

[Baron Sardonicus]

The Pioneer could easily afford several times the scholarships they currently offer.


:D

[DFW HOYA]

The Pioneer could easily afford several times the scholarships they currently offer.


The Pioneer schools actually offer scholarships--merit scholarships. Not all schools do.

[Lehigh Football Nation]

The issue is: at a sport level, football is governed by the NCAA using strict scholarship limits. It's literally how the subdivisions are defined:

FBS: 85 scholarship headcount, all full scholarship
FCS: 85 scholarship headcount, 63 equivalent scholarships that can be broken up

Additional conferences decide if they want extra restrictions (Ivies not allowed to have any scholarships based on athletics; Patriot League caps its equivalencies to 60; Ivy and PL have academic restrictions; NEC operates with limits on equivalencies). But the main definition of the subdivisions is based on scholarship limits.

If the new structure essentially removes the limits on equivalencies and nothing else, that makes FCS a free-for-all - those schools could basically operate as 85 full scholarship schools if they wanted. What would separate it from FBS aside a playoff?

More worryingly, though, "Division I football" could decide that 85 full-ride football players are the only way forward to be a Division I football program. If that happens, the MEAC and SWAC become D-II tomorrow, followed by the NEC. And the Patriot League and Ivy League will have a difficult decision on their hands as to what to do.

Without an NCAA keeping them in check, what's stopping the SEC from doing this?

[Baron Sardonicus]

The Pioneer schools actually offer scholarships--merit scholarships. Not all schools do.

Save those crocodile tears. Georgetown aid meets 100 percent of demonstated need. Not all schoils do.

[walliver]

The article mentioned in the first post on this thread says that the limits would remain in place for football and basketball. Since FCS has equivalency rules in place (63 scholarships among 85 players), FCS might have a new limit of 85.

I suspect very few FCS schools will have any need to go past 63 full scholarships since very few FCS schools are actually making money.

What I fear is the the subdivisions themselves will disappear, as will the FCS playoffs. The SEC and B1G will have their own playoff, possibly allowing a few ACC, PAC and B12 teams to participate. The rest of D-1 will have lesser bowl games (not a big change). Current FCS conferences might create an alliance (outside the NCAA) for a playoff or minor bowl games. The CAA and Big Sky might have conference championship games and so forth.

Short of congressional action (and I don't trust any iteration of the US Congress to fix this appropriately), there will be anarchy at the top, and the lesser conference members will play for conference championships with their own rules and limits

[WestCoastAggie]

The article mentioned in the first post on this thread says that the limits would remain in place for football and basketball. Since FCS has equivalency rules in place (63 scholarships among 85 players), FCS might have a new limit of 85.

I suspect very few FCS schools will have any need to go past 63 full scholarships since very few FCS schools are actually making money.

What I fear is the the subdivisions themselves will disappear, as will the FCS playoffs. The SEC and B1G will have their own playoff, possibly allowing a few ACC, PAC and B12 teams to participate. The rest of D-1 will have lesser bowl games (not a big change). Current FCS conferences might create an alliance (outside the NCAA) for a playoff or minor bowl games. The CAA and Big Sky might have conference championship games and so forth.

Short of congressional action (and I don't trust any iteration of the US Congress to fix this appropriately), there will be anarchy at the top, and the lesser conference members will play for conference championships with their own rules and limits

I can see quite a few FCS teams increasing their scholarships equivalencies towards 85, or even higher in some cases. It won't be every FCS school and it's going to depend on the presidents and their priorities. It's going to definitely cause a situation where the Big Sky, CAA, and MVFC align themselves closer to the current G5 conferences than they align with the rest of FCS.

And for the remaining MEAC schools; do they really want to be part of this or are they going to even be cut out by it?

[DFW HOYA]

Save those crocodile tears. Georgetown aid meets 100 percent of demonstated need. Not all schoils do.

Only 14 schools in FCS do this. However, as I've said before, the lack of need aid above "demonstrated" puts Georgetown at a disadvantage against merit schools when "demonstrated need" does not cover families with earnings above, say, $100K. At that point, a $20K or $40K "merit" award isn't an athletic scholarship but looks pretty good to a parent.

[JSUSoutherner]

The Pioneer schools actually offer scholarships--merit scholarships. Not all schools do.
Strange. Pioneer League football has an incredible lack of merit.

[KnightoftheRedFlash]

Doesn't matter to the NEC. The conference will remain irrelevant.

[Bisonoline]

The issue is: at a sport level, football is governed by the NCAA using strict scholarship limits. It's literally how the subdivisions are defined:

FBS: 85 scholarship headcount, all full scholarship
FCS: 85 scholarship headcount, 63 equivalent scholarships that can be broken up

Additional conferences decide if they want extra restrictions (Ivies not allowed to have any scholarships based on athletics; Patriot League caps its equivalencies to 60; Ivy and PL have academic restrictions; NEC operates with limits on equivalencies). But the main definition of the subdivisions is based on scholarship limits.

If the new structure essentially removes the limits on equivalencies and nothing else, that makes FCS a free-for-all - those schools could basically operate as 85 full scholarship schools if they wanted. What would separate it from FBS aside a playoff?

More worryingly, though, "Division I football" could decide that 85 full-ride football players are the only way forward to be a Division I football program. If that happens, the MEAC and SWAC become D-II tomorrow, followed by the NEC. And the Patriot League and Ivy League will have a difficult decision on their hands as to what to do.

Without an NCAA keeping them in check, what's stopping the SEC from doing this?

The SEC has autonomy and will do what it wants.

[Libertine]

Strange. Pioneer League football has an incredible lack of merit.

Badum bum

xlolx


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