Running FCS playoff thread

Many of us attended FCS schools. The playoffs deserve their own thread, so it doesn't get clogged up in the week-to-week FBS discussion.

Here's the playoff bracket. A glaring omission? Ivy champ Yale, because even though the league lets every other sport play for an NCAA title, it still prohibits its football champion from participating in the postseason.

Certainly this is a Title IX violation and somebody should litigate it. I'm frankly shocked no one has (to my knowledge). Free the Eli!

https://www.ncaa.com/news/football/...bracket-date-time-location-tv-channel-history

 

Just means more in the Dakotas, I guess.

 

Don't have a dog on the hunt, but don't sleep on Sacramento State.

 

Jackson State as well, and for the same reason. The SWAC decided to break off from the FCS playoff system and do its own thing in the late 90s. Now it has a team ranked in the top 5 that could probably make some noise, and it won't get the chance.

 

Nice to see Idaho in there, for many reasons. And the Hornets.

 

Fascinating that the Ivy League winner and SWAC winner won’t play in the
FCS playoffs

 

By next September, I will have gone from attending a school with no football to attending a FCS school to attending a (second) FBS school, all without registering for an additional credit hour.

 

The SWAC doesn't because it can make more money with the Thanksgiving weekend game at New Orleans.

 

Incarnate Word is an interesting story. Program was founded in 2009 at the D-II level and moved up to FCS in 2013. They never won more than 6 games in a season until the last two years. (Full disclosure: I'm acquainted with their first-year head coach, GJ Kinne.)

 

And presumably the championship game and Celebration Bowl as well, instead of what would probably be a one-and-done playoff appearance most years.

 

The SWAC and MEAC allow teams to participate, just not the division/conference champions.

FAMU earned an at-large last year, while Jackson State and PVA&M were the division winners that played for the league title.

 

Elon-Furman is an old SoCon matchup in the first round. St. Francis could be pretty tricky for Delaware. The Red Flash only lost by 10 at Richmond and hung with FBS Akron. ... And the NCAA rules preventing a conference rematch in the first round led to a couple of long trips for teams. Obviously would have made more geographic sense to have Idaho play at Montana and then pair SE Louisiana and SE Missouri, but Idaho and Montana played in the regular season, so Idaho gets to go to Hammond and SEMO heads up to Missoula.