Wikipedia talk:WikiProject College football

College Division / University Division

From the above discussion... a suggestion:

• Retain existing "19xx NCAA College Division football season" articles for 1964 through 1972, as the College Division regional finals and the NCAA College Division Football Committee demonstrably existed during those seasons, AND
• For the 1956 to 1963 articles structured as College/University/NAIA, either:
  • a) merge their content into unified "19xx college football season" articles (as already exist for 1955 and earlier), OR
  • b) re-present the content in two articles for each season where the split is between "major" and "small college" (see Wikipedia:WikiProject College football/Major vs small college compendium, which should be helpful to such an effort).

Dmoore5556 (talk) 05:27, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

• My thoughts are still forming as we dig into the issue, but here are my takes so far:

1) Agree that the "19xx College Division football season" articles from 1956 to at least 1961 are based on original and/or flawed research and need to be changed.

2) Agree that the "19xx College Division football season" articles from 1964 forward be left as is. I would go further and extend this back to 1962 when we have this quote from NCAA executive director Walter Byers referring to "our University and College divisions" and giving a specific breakdown that there were at that time 140 schools playing football in the University Division and 370 programs competing in the college division. To my mind, this is clear evidence that the "University/College Division" split had occurred by 1962.

3) For the earlier years, I was initially inclined to split them (and probably support the split) into separate "major" and "small" college articles. However, as we've begun to dig in, second thoughts have developed due to

(a) ambiguity and uncertainty as to which programs were considered "major" vs "small" (there were inconsistencies in how some teams were classified),

(b) uncertainty as to which designators of "major" status we should report. So far, we have multiple and sometimes inconsitent designations by (i) FWAA (unfortunately, we don't yet have its annual lists of the schools it designated as "major"), (ii) the NCAA Service Bureau which divided its annual statistical reports between schools designated as "major" and "small", (iii) AP Newsfeatures' pre-season publication of "major college" football schedules,

(c) the split creates an issue as to how we should treat certain conferences. For example, in 1948, only two of five MVC schools (3/9 Border, 4/6 Skyline, 12/16 SoCon) were considered "major". Cbl62 (talk) 09:22, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

Cbl62 good insight, thanks. The 1962 Byers quote is still problematic, as a) the Miami News column in question is the only known instance where a writer attributed such a statement to Byers, and b) 140 is an overly high number of programs to consider "major", as other sources (such as the published schedules, example) put the number in the 120s. I would like to see some corroborating source(s), lest this simply be a case of one columnist's notes being off. I will dig some more, as time permits. Dmoore5556 (talk) 14:43, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

The 1962 record is not as clear as we'd like, but I see the Byers quote as pretty decent evidence. It's conceivable that the reporter may have gotten the precise counts for either division off by a bit, but it seems unlikely that the reporter (a 30-year veteran reporter and sports editor of a major newspaper) just made up the whole sequence of quotes from Byers about the two divisions. Cbl62 (talk) 23:19, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

Here are the relevant pages from the 1963 NCAA records book. PK-WIKI (talk) 22:31, 9 May 2024 (UTC)

PK-WIKI, the 1963 NCAA records book content is helpful, thank you. I've done some additional digging, and found a relevant article from 1961, as below. Newspaper mentions of "college division" before 1961 that I've looked through are not specific to football; most are about basketball, with some cross-country mentions. Standard disclaimer that there could be other content, which I've not found.

• • November 1961 article here discussing how the NCAA is "anxious" for postseason football games in the college division.
  • January 1960 article here which starts off discussing football substitution rules, and later makes a mention of college division in the general sense (not specific to football), which I highlight here because it gives a very specific figure for the size of a school then considered "NCAA (small) college division"—less than 705 students. This is curiously inconsistent with other content we see where the major/small categorization in football was decided by the FWAA. Dmoore5556 (talk) 23:17, 9 May 2024 (UTC)

The pages referenced by PK-WIKI from the 1963 NCAA annual are pretty definitive: the split between the College and University Divisions were a real and official thing in 1963. It would be interesting to see how the 1962 NCAA annual dealt with the matter. Cbl62 (talk) 00:22, 10 May 2024 (UTC)

@PK-WIKI: Would you be willing either (a) to share the full range of pages from the 1963 NCAA annual that identify the University Division Schools, or (b) transcribe the list of University Division schools at Wikipedia:WikiProject College football/Major vs small college compendium#1963. Thanks for finding this! Cbl62 (talk) 00:34, 10 May 2024 (UTC)

No problem, here are the 1963 University Division schedules. PK-WIKI (talk) 01:34, 10 May 2024 (UTC)

Cbl62, I agree, it would be insightful to see how things were presented in the 1962 NCAA book. Since PK-WIKI noted above that he doesn't have a copy of the 1962 edition, I just purchased one via eBay, and I'll provide an update here as soon as I get it (hopefully early next week). PK-WIKI, if you later want the 1962 edition to add to your collection, I'd be happy to send it to you. Dmoore5556 (talk) 06:22, 10 May 2024 (UTC)

I should receive the 1962 NCAA book tomorrow (Wednesday) and will provide an update as soon as possible. Dmoore5556 (talk) 03:17, 15 May 2024 (UTC)

The 1962 NCAA book (with Sonny Gibbs on the cover) did arrive—I've looked through it, and it does not make any mention of the NCAA having College and University Divisions. What I see is:

• A section on "Major-College Statistics" and a section on "Small-College Statistics". The Small-College section starts with an explanatory paragraph: "Approximately 110 college football teams, which play most of their games against each other, are classified as 'major-college' teams. ... The football teams of all other colleges and universities comprise the 'small-college' field. An official list is issued annually by the Football Writers' Association of America, the official classifying authority."
• A single section with "1962 NCAA-Member Schedules". This is presented alphabetically (e.g. Alabama is followed by Albion College), and without designation of whether a team is 'major' or not.
• As a bit of an aside: final standings for the 1961 season in the Middle Atlantic Conference (MAC, but not today's Mid-American Conference) show that it was divided into three divisions—University, College North, and College South. But these were not new, as the MAC organized itself that way from the late 1950s (source) through the 1969 season. These divisions are visible in Template:1958 Middle Atlantic Conference football standings through Template:1969 Middle Atlantic Conference football standings. Such a structure was (from what I can tell) unique to the MAC and done by the conference itself, independent of the NCAA.

If anyone wants other info from this record book, let me know.

Considering the clear contrast between the 1962 record book and 1963 record book... that looks to be the transition point from no organizational split, to having University and College divisions. Having different record keeping for teams deemed major-college and small-college dates to earlier (apparently, the 1930s) but does not reflect an organizational split. Dmoore5556 (talk) 23:08, 15 May 2024 (UTC)

I should also add... we are left with an inconsistency for 1962, where the Record Book doesn't show University/College but there's a statement (here) about University/College by Walter Byers. There was certainly a time gap between the issuing of the Record Book (it doesn't say what month it was published, but it's certainly no later than September 1962, and likely a few months earlier) and Byers' statement, which was published on December 12, 1962. It would seem either the NCAA decided late in the 1962 pre-season to implement University/College (that is, it happened after the Record Book was finalized) or perhaps Byers was looking ahead to the 1963 season (he was speaking about a "comprehensive survey" that had not yet happened). I'd be curious as to if anything the 1963 Record Book makes mention of University/College existing during the prior (1962) season, or just in the 1963 schedules. Dmoore5556 (talk) 23:27, 15 May 2024 (UTC)

For completeness, there is a source cited in 1956 NCAA University Division football season which states:

Before we list those players, we must first note how the NCAA divisions used to be organized. Prior to 1956, there were no Divisions in college football. Between 1956 and 1972, schools were categorized in either the “University Division” or the “College Division”. In 1973, the University Division became Division I while the College Division becamse Divisions II and III. There was another split in 1978, with Division I breaking up into Division I and Division I-AA. In 2006, we saw the new classification of the FBS and FCS arise. That is our current structure.

The source is this page on the heisman.com site, published in July 2016 and authored by one Chris Hudson. I view the "Between 1956 and 1972" statement as a well-intended attempt to clarify history, but it ultimately lacks sourcing and does not hold up to scrutiny. His statement would be accurate in a basketball context, but not in a football context, even though it "sounds good".

Next steps

I believe we are at a point where the unified content found at 1955 college football season should be extended through at least 1961 college football season, and the first season to have separate University Division and College Division articles should be either 1962 or 1963. Comments?

Note that NAIA season articles begin with 1956 NAIA football season, so whether that content should be included in the above, or left to stand on their own, also merits some consideration. I have not looked into NAIA football history, so I don't know to what degree the unsourced statement "The 1956 NAIA football season was the first season of college football sponsored by the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics." is factually accurate.

Lastly, we should also consider whether to make changes directly (WP:BOLD), or via WP:MERGE, or ?

Thank you to all who have participated in this (now quite lengthy) discussion. Dmoore5556 (talk) 20:58, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

Upper Midwest Athletic Conference: NAIA or NCAA D3?

I came across a slew of conference standings templates for Upper Midwest Athletic Conference (and began a TfD for a majority of them here for anyone interested in participating). However, I noticed that for the 2002 and 2003 templates, they are included in both 2002 NCAA Division III football season and 2002 NAIA football season, and both 2003 NCAA Division III football season and 2003 NAIA football season. I don't think programs can be part of the NCAA and NAIA in the same season, so could anyone help out and figure out which league these conferences belong to? Eagles 24/7 (C) 19:02, 10 May 2024 (UTC)

It was certainly the case at one time that a single conference could include both NAIA and NCAA teams, c.f. Template:1981 Lone Star Conference football standings. That's also a very silly set of TfDs. Jweiss11 (talk) 19:24, 10 May 2024 (UTC)

@Jweiss11: The article Upper Midwest Athletic Conference says it joined the NCAA in 2008 from the NAIA. It looks like you added these templates to each of the NCAA and NAIA season articles, could you clarify or source in the article what happened with their league affiliations? And I agree it is very silly that there are so many of these standings templates that are only used in one article, since it defeats the purpose of a template. Eagles 24/7 (C) 21:05, 10 May 2024 (UTC)

It's not silly at all if you consider the principles of consistency and parallelism and think about how articles related to these templates are almost surely going to evolve. The UMAC's website says the conference joined the NCAA in 2008 here: https://umacathletics.com/sports/2008/2/28/History.aspx. The NCAA website indicates that Northwestern (MN) joined the NCAA in 2008 (https://stats.ncaa.org/teams/history?utf8=%E2%9C%93&org_id=30031&sport_code=MFB&commit=Searchthat) but that Martin Luther has been an NCAA member since 1991 (https://stats.ncaa.org/teams/history?utf8=%E2%9C%93&org_id=8597&sport_code=MFB&commit=Search). So in 2002, and a few other years, the UMAC apparently included both NAIA and NCAA teams. Jweiss11 (talk) 21:18, 10 May 2024 (UTC)

@Jweiss11: Do you think a note should be added to some of these standings templates to indicate which league the team was a member of? I find these mixed-league conferences are confusing to readers (and me). And since these standings templates are being created before team articles, season articles, and other list articles for the programs, context may be needed to understand them. Eagles 24/7 (C) 21:55, 10 May 2024 (UTC)

Note of clarification that, at one time, it was not uncommon for schools to belong to both the NCAA and NAIA. I don't know to what degree that was the case "only" ~20 years ago, but this article from July 1958 notes around 120 small colleges were, at that time, members of both organizations. Dmoore5556 (talk) 02:54, 11 May 2024 (UTC)

Oklahoma Panhandle State was a NCAA Division II independent and a member of the NAIA Central States Football League well into the 2010s. They joined the Lone Star Conference before dropping down to NAIA and re-join the SAC.-UCO2009bluejay (talk) 21:27, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

CFB HOF

I just went through and reconciled the CFB HOF inductee lists with Category:College Football Hall of Fame inductees, and came up with 129 names that need to be added to the category. I don't have time to work on them now, but I figured if someone is looking for a project I can provide the list. LMK. Jb45424 (talk) 00:56, 16 May 2024 (UTC)

Is what needs to be done, simply adding Category:College Football Hall of Fame inductees to 129 different articles? Dmoore5556 (talk) 01:32, 16 May 2024 (UTC)

Yes. Jb45424 (talk) 03:20, 16 May 2024 (UTC)

OK—perhaps create a list, similar to (and simpler than) Wikipedia:WikiProject College football/CFHOF article improvement campaign, so volunteers can edit as time allows and mark as completed. Dmoore5556 (talk) 04:01, 16 May 2024 (UTC)

Follow up: WikiOriginal-9 updated 96 of these articles on 17 May, and I updated the remaining 33 today. So the work is done. Y Jb45424 (talk) 11:47, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

Cleveland Plain Dealer

The Cleveland Plain Dealer is now available digitally on Newspapers.com. Woohoo! Cbl62 (talk) 16:27, 20 May 2024 (UTC)

Most excellent! When my local Dayton papers were added to Newspapers.com, it was honestly one of the happiest days of my life! Jb45424 (talk) 16:35, 20 May 2024 (UTC)

Short names for junior college programs

In recent weeks, Cbl62, Thetreesarespeakingtome, and I have done a bunch work to expand our coverage of junior college football, e.g. 1941 Los Angeles City Cubs football team, 1967 junior college football season, and 2023 junior college football season. An issue that needs some discussion and resolution is the naming scheme for a few junior college athletics programs. I'll kick things off with a couple examples.

• The Pierce Brahmas of Los Angeles Pierce College: based on Newspapers.com sources from the 1940s to 1980s, the most common short name here appears to be simply "Pierce". Consider the sources cited in these standings templates: https://en.wiki.x.io/wiki/Special:WhatLinksHere?target=Pierce+Brahmas+football&namespace=10. But current definitive standings reports from the California Community College Athletic Association (3C2A or CCCAA) employ "LA Pierce"; see here. Our categorization scheme here is currently a mess, employing "LAPC", "Los Angeles Pierce", and "Pierce"; see Category:Los Angeles Pierce College. There is also the added issue of the fight name: Brahmas or Brahma Bulls?

• The San Joaquin Delta Mustangs of San Joaquin Delta College: the school was known as Stockton Junior College from 1935 to 1948 and Stockton College 1948 to 1963, so before the fall of 1963, I think "Stockton Mustangs" is most appropriate and then "San Joaquin Delta Mustangs" starting then. The school now self-brands its teams as "Delta College Mustangs", but I'm not sure when that started; see here. The CCCAA standings reports linked above still use "San Joaquin Delta". Our categorization scheme at Category:San Joaquin Delta College is inconsistent.

Thoughts on these two to start? Cbl62 may have more examples worthy of discussion. Jweiss11 (talk) 17:00, 22 May 2024 (UTC)

• I lived for over 20 years in the San Fernando Valley and always heard the school referred to as Pierce College, never as LA Pierce College. I took a photo of the gym years ago (File:Pierce College South Gymnasium.JPG) that refers to it as simply "Pierce College" and denotes the mascot as the Brahmas. Cbl62 (talk) 22:56, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

CfD: Category:1941 junior college football season

Category:1941 junior college football season has been nominated for merging. Please the discussion at Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 May 23#Category:1941 junior college football season. Jweiss11 (talk) 14:25, 23 May 2024 (UTC)

2020-21 seasons

Moving this here.

Was there a discussion on what to do for the COVID-19 season in terms of coaching record tables? There about a million and a half different ways it has been expressed and I am unsure as to which should be done. I feel as though there are multiple feasible ways but I am unsure of a consensus which will tie into another point.

Option A, just stating no team
Year Team Overall Conference Standing Bowl/playoffs Framingham State Rams (Massachusetts State Collegiate Athletic Conference) (2020) 2020–21 Framingham State No team Framingham State: 0–0 0–0 Total: 0–0

Option B, no team + —COVID-19 like what was done with World War II teams that did not play
Year Team Overall Conference Standing Bowl/playoffs Framingham State Rams (Massachusetts State Collegiate Athletic Conference) (2020) 2020–21 Framingham State No team—COVID-19 Framingham State: 0–0 0–0 Total: 0–0

Option C, no team + note
Year Team Overall Conference Standing Bowl/playoffs Framingham State Rams (Massachusetts State Collegiate Athletic Conference) (2020) 2020–21 Framingham State No team Framingham State: 0–0 0–0 Total: 0–0

This goes along with the next point on if a season was played, should there be a note in the record table explaining that the games were played in the spring or just leave it without.

Third point, should 2020 be grayed out on the coaches navboxes like I did for:

{{Albany State Golden Rams football coach navbox}} {{Adams State Grizzlies football coach navbox}}

If we do that, that would also go in hand with what was done for World War II, but again, just a few questions for you/seeing if there was a consensus already. Thanks! Thetreesarespeakingtome (talk) 00:25, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

I, personally, believe option B is the best along with greying out the year in the navbox, although that will cause a small issue with {{Framingham State Rams football coach navbox}}'s Aynsley Rosenbaum and {{Azusa Pacific Cougars football coach navbox}}'s Rudy Carlton. Thetreesarespeakingtome (talk) 00:27, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

Thetreesarespeakingtome, thanks for bringing this up. I don't believe there ever was a discussion about this. It's probably worth transferring this discussion to WT:CFB to get more input. Option B seems best to me as well for consistency with how we've treated the World Wars. As for Rosenbaum and Carlton, since they never logged a single decision as head coach on their ledger, I think they fall into the category of a Bo Rein at LSU. Jweiss11 (talk) 01:49, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

Thetreesarespeakingtome (talk) 02:31, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

@Thetreesarespeakingtome: Instead of linking to COVID-19, which is the article about the virus, linking to COVID-19 pandemic or COVID-19 pandemic in the United States or Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on sports seems more appropriate. Or maybe there should be a new article for Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on sports in the United States? Jweiss11 (talk) 01:38, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on gridiron football, perhaps? Thetreesarespeakingtome (talk) 01:41, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

Yeah, that one looks like the best option. Jweiss11 (talk) 01:45, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

Conference awards in infoboxes

There is a proposal at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject National Football League#Proposal: Remove (some) conference awards from infoboxes that editors may be interested in.-UCO2009bluejay (talk) 14:00, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

Current starting QB navbox

Template:Southeastern Conference starting quarterbacks navbox, what are the thoughts about this?-UCO2009bluejay (talk) 03:01, 29 May 2024 (UTC)

Burn it with fire. Changes too often to provide any lasting value. Case in point, 6 of the 14 entries are currently incorrect, as those six players are currently either in NFL camps, or have transferred to other colleges. Ejgreen77 (talk) 03:44, 29 May 2024 (UTC)

Yeah, delete this per Ejgreen77's reasoning. Jweiss11 (talk) 04:09, 29 May 2024 (UTC)

J. J. McCarthy

See Wikipedia talk:WikiProject National Football League#J. J. McCarthy’s lead (again). Cbl62 (talk) 21:09, 2 June 2024 (UTC)

Service academy football

An A&E biography on Admiral William Halsey Jr. is on and it mentioned how he "played football on one of the worst team's in [Naval A]cademy history." All editorialism aside, I checked his page and it didn't have the Navy Midshipmen category and the WP:CFB tag on the talk page despite having information about his playing days in prose. It makes me wonder how many pages might also have these oversights?-UCO2009bluejay (talk) 01:12, 3 June 2024 (UTC)

Probably not that surprising for someone who played pre-Wikipedia and is not primarily known as a football player to be overlooked. —Bagumba (talk) 01:49, 3 June 2024 (UTC)

The service academy football teams have included many important military figures. For example, the 1912 Army Cadets football team included Dwight Eisenhower, Omar Bradley, Vernon Prichard, Louis A. Merrilat, Geoffrey Keyes, William M. Hoge, and Leland Devore -- not to mention Tennessee coaching legend Robert Neyland. For anyone looking for a worthwhile project, improving the service academy season articles (as well as adding CFB tags to player bios) is worth considering. Cbl62 (talk) 01:58, 3 June 2024 (UTC)

I'm not going to lie, I am not very strong at article improvement when it comes to promoting articles to GA, let alone FA. I can write well off Wikipedia, but I am completely unsure what really makes the threshold (and yes I've read the pages about that). But, I admire how the NFL project is working on making lists FLs. I wonder if a good start would be to raise Army, Navy, Air Force, and even the D-III Coast Guard program articles, head coaches, seasons, and bowl lists, to that standard?-UCO2009bluejay (talk) 02:14, 3 June 2024 (UTC)

July 1 realignment moves

I have noticed that some editors have started to move certain pages to their new conference affiliation ex, UCLA Bruins football, DeShaun Foster. When should these pages actually be updated? If it is in-fact on July 1, when should it be 12:00 am EDT, 6/30 11 CDT, 6/30 9 PDT, or 12 EDT, 12 CDT etc? (Eastern-time or institution time specific)-UCO2009bluejay (talk) 16:03, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

More examples Template:Southeastern Conference football navbox updated for 2024, Template:Southeastern Conference football rivalry navbox not fully updated for 2024.-UCO2009bluejay (talk) 16:09, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

I think it's probably okay to start making the changes now for the realignments that will occur on July 1. Jweiss11 (talk) 02:45, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

I concur. glman (talk) 14:11, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

@Bagumba: what do you think?-UCO2009bluejay (talk) 12:49, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

No opinion, but Foster's ibx has had Big Ten since Feb. —Bagumba (talk) 14:31, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

"19xx college football season" articles

Regarding the above series of articles, I've started adding a section for annual statistical leaders. E.g., 1950 leaders, 1951 leaders, 1952 leaders, 1953 leaders, 1954 leaders, 1955 leaders, 1956 leaders.

Any suggestions on formatting? Is the top 10 a reasonable cutoff? Should we include other categories such as punting? Team passing offense? Team passing defense? Team rushing offense? Team rushing defense? I also welcome help building this out for other seasons (the data can be found in both annual NCAA guides and in post-season newspaper reports). Cbl62 (talk) 21:46, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

Someone should make an article for the 1950 receiving leader (Gordon Cooper (American football)) ~WikiOriginal-9~ (talk) 01:18, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

I'll look into it :) BeanieFan11 (talk) 02:10, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

@WikiOriginal-9: Done: Gordon Cooper (American football). BeanieFan11 (talk) 21:45, 9 June 2024 (UTC)

• I've now also added the small-college stat leaders at 1956 college football season#Statistical leaders. Cbl62 (talk) 22:44, 7 June 2024 (UTC)
• 1957 college football season#Statistical leaders done too. Cbl62 (talk) 17:15, 9 June 2024 (UTC)

• Cbl62, we need to figure out what's happening with the the NAIA seasons here and fix broken architecture at Template:Infobox college football season and Template:NCAA football season navbox and in the category tree. Did we reach a consensus on when the University/College division split happened for football? Jweiss11 (talk) 17:39, 9 June 2024 (UTC)

• There was some disagreement as to the exact year, but it's somewhere between 1962 and 1964. I won't modify those years until there's consensus. Cbl62 (talk) 03:00, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

• So for now 1962 will be the first season with a divisional split? Jweiss11 (talk) 22:07, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

• I will defer to User:Dmoore5556 on which year to start the University/College Division split. Cbl62 (talk) 04:26, 12 June 2024 (UTC)

• I believe we should have unified (merged) articles up to and including 1961, and independent articles for 1963 and later. 1962 is less clear (lots of discussion elsewhere on this page) but at this point I'd say leave 1962 as-is (un-merged), primarily due to the Walter Byers quote, subject to a later change should something else come to light. Dmoore5556 (talk) 01:13, 13 June 2024 (UTC)

• 1958 and 1959 college football season#Statistical leaders done too. Cbl62 (talk) 04:24, 12 June 2024 (UTC)
• 1960 and 1961 now done as well. Cbl62 (talk) 03:52, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

• Cbl, thanks for all your work on this stuff. Some outstanding issues: 1) 1957 NAIA football season is still a stand-alone article. 2) How should we reflect the early NAIA seasons at Template:NAIA football navbox? 3) At 1960 college football season, for example, many standings templates, like Template:1960 Pennsylvania State College Conference football standings, are listed twice, under both "Minor conferences" and "NAIA conferences". 4) The category tree for both articles and standings templates needs to be updated according to these changes in the season naming scheme, see Category:1960 college football season, Category:1960 American football standings templates, etc. Jweiss11 (talk) 17:44, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

1956 college football season

Cbl62, I see you moved 1956 NCAA University Division football season to 1956 college football season per the above discussion. I have no object with eliminating College and University Divisions for this season, but 1956 NCAA College Division football season need to be merged in there. And what do we do with 1956 NAIA football season? Also, Template:NCAA football season navbox need to be updated accordingly. 02:44, 7 June 2024 (UTC) Jweiss11 (talk) 02:44, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

Per the discussion, I think both should be merged. Do you disagree? Cbl62 (talk) 02:58, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

No, I'm not against merging the NAIA article. But when do we start the stand-alone NAIA season articles? Whenever the University/College Division split in the NCAA happened? Also, merging the 1956 NAIA article with the 1956 NCAA College Division article will induce a CFB link call crisis. We need to create more 1956 team articles to avert this. Same for 1957, etc. Jweiss11 (talk) 04:57, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

Per the discussion I merged all three (University Division, College Division, and NAIA) into 1956 college football season.Cbl62 (talk) 04:28, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

Team categories holding only 1 article on a season

I am closing Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 May 13#Category:Pocatello Army Air Base Bombardiers football seasons with consensus to merge a single-season category.

Looking around the hierarchy, I see that e.g. Category:Air Transport Command Rockets football holds only one article 1945 Air Transport Command Rockets football team via a "seasons" sub-cat. The team category is also parented by Category:United States Army Air Forces sports teams, Category:College football teams in Tennessee and Category:Defunct American football teams in Tennessee.

There are similar category pairs within Category:Defunct college football teams each holding a single season article. Do these really have navigational value?

Note that each article will always remain within the college football category hierarchy via the season e.g. Category:1945 college football season. – Fayenatic London 08:44, 14 June 2024 (UTC)

I would say, yes, there is navigational value to have Category:Air Transport Command Rockets football seasons listed under Category:College football seasons by team. Jweiss11 (talk) 17:09, 14 June 2024 (UTC)

2024–25 bowl schedule released

FYI at https://bowlseason.com/sports/bowl/schedule/

Of note:

• Compared to recent playings, a couple games have been moved from January to December (Reliaquest Bowl, Citrus Bowl) while other games have been moved from December to January (First Responder Bowl, Duke's Mayo Bowl, Bahamas Bowl)
• Quick Lane Bowl lost Ford as its sponsor and is listed as "Detroit Bowl" while they seek a new title sponsor.

Feels WP:TOOSOON to create the season's bowl games article; passing along for reference. Dmoore5556 (talk) 01:24, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

I went ahead and created {{2024 bowl game navbox}} just to be ready; if there are any "(January)" or "(December)" instances missing that anyone finds please go ahead and add them. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 15:53, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

I'll take a look, thanks. I added disambiguation to a couple articles yesterday: 2024 Citrus Bowl (January) and 2024 ReliaQuest Bowl (January), as we will later have (December) variants. Dmoore5556 (talk) 19:12, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

On another note, how do we want to handle the first-round CFP games? I assume they won't each get their own article but should we have a summary article just for them (i.e. 2024–25 College Football Playoff first round, or something like that), or just let the overall 2024–25 College Football Playoff article summarize them? PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 15:58, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

2024–25 College Football Playoff only, please. Dmoore5556 (talk) 19:12, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

Yeah, I think we should probably limit the first-round games to detail at 2024–25 College Football Playoff and the respective team season articles. Stand-alone articles should probably only be created if a particular game rises to high, lasting notability like the rare cases of such regular season games found at Template:Historic college football games. Jweiss11 (talk) 17:23, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Fairmont State Fighting Falcons

There's a deletion discussion on the Fairmont State Fighting Falcons (an NCAA Division II program) that may be of interest. BeanieFan11 (talk) 19:36, 19 June 2024 (UTC)

Archive plan for Pac-12 conference pages and navboxes

I noticed @KingSkyLord today made a number of edits adding/removing navboxes from the departing Pac-12 members' sports articles.

Templates such as Template:Pac-12_Conference_football_rivalry_navbox have also been edited to remove the departing members.

First, I think these changes are premature. The Huskies, at least, don't join the Big Ten until August 2nd.

Second, I would perhaps like to see some kind of "Historic" information about the Pac-12 preserved in these articles and navboxes. Does this kind of information exist for any of the other disbanded conferences? What should be kept as-is for the Pac-12 and archived or marked as "historic"? What should be updated, in the short term, to only include WSU and OSU?

Some reference points:

• Southwest Conference
• Big East Conference
• Big East Conference (1979–2013)
• Template:Big_East_Conference_football_navbox

Seeking opinions on what should be done for the article on the historic Pac-12 Conference, the upcoming "Pac-2 Conference", their nav boxes, the team pages, etc.

PK-WIKI (talk) 16:51, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

We typically haven't kept former team information in navboxes, see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject College football/Archive 17#Defunct conferences as precedent. And per my question above, some editors have contended that it isn't too early to move to new conferences.-UCO2009bluejay (talk) 16:00, 25 June 2024 (UTC)

CfD: Category:Northwest Community College Conference football standings templates

I have nominated Category:Northwest Community College Conference football standings templates for renaming. Please see the discussion here. Thanks, Jweiss11 (talk) 05:52, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

CfD: Category:Kenyon Lords and Ladies

I have nominated Category:Kenyon Lords and Ladies and its subcats for renaming. Please see the discussion here. Thanks, Jweiss11 (talk) 17:17, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

Nomination for deletion of Template:Southeastern Conference starting quarterbacks navbox

Template:Southeastern Conference starting quarterbacks navbox has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the entry on the Templates for discussion page. UCO2009bluejay (talk) 23:06, 25 June 2024 (UTC)