A college football game between Colorado State and Air

Force
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
College football is American football played by
teams of student athletes fielded by American
universities, colleges, and military academies, or
Canadian football played by teams of student
athletes fielded by Canadian universities. It was
through college football play that American football
rules first gained popularity in the United States.
1 History
1.1 Rugby in England and Canada
1.2 First American college football
game
1.3 Rugby is adopted by American
colleges
1.4 Rugby becomes American football
1.5 Formation of the NCAA
2 Official rules and notable rule distinctions
3 Organization
4 Coaching
5 National championships
6 Team maps
7 Playoff games
8 Bowl games
8.1 Bowl Championship Series
9 Controversy
10 College football outside the United States
11 Awards
12 See also
13 References
14 See also
15 External links
15.1 Statistics
15.2 Rules
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A college football game
between Texas Tech and Navy
15.3 Maps
Rugby in England and Canada
Modern North American football has its origins in various games, all known as
"football", played at public schools in England in the mid-19th century. By the
1840s, students at Rugby School were playing a game in which players were able
to pick up the ball and run with it, a sport later known as Rugby football. The
game was taken to Canada by British soldiers stationed there and was soon being
played at Canadian colleges.
The first documented gridiron football match was a game played at University
College, a college of the University of Toronto, November 9, 1861. One of the
participants in the game involving University of Toronto students was (Sir)
William Mulock, later Chancellor of the school. A football club was formed at
the university soon afterward, although its rules of play at this stage are unclear.
In 1864, at Trinity College, also a college of the University of Toronto, F. Barlow Cumberland and Frederick A.
Bethune devised rules based on rugby football. Modern Canadian football is widely regarded as having
originated with a game played in Montreal, in 1865, when British Army officers played local civilians. The game
gradually gained a following, and the Montreal Football Club was formed in 1868, the first recorded
non-university football club in Canada.
First American college football game
The first ever intercollegiate football game between two American teams played under rules which would
eventually become the rules under which modern American football is governed occurred between Princeton
and Rutgers University in 1869. However, this game was far more like that of soccer than what has come to be
recognized as American football. The completion of the first ever American football season came as a result of
only two total games being played.
A game which modern audiences would more readily recognize as American football occurred six years after
the first ever game and occurred between Harvard University and Tufts University on June 4, 1875.
[1]
The first
game ever played that resembles the game as it is known today was played between an American team,
Harvard, and a Canadian team, McGill University of Montreal in 1874. Harvard, who was trying to get away
from the soccer like game that many schools played, set out to find another school who played a game similar to
them. This first game was a lot like rugby but much closer to the modern day version of football than soccer.
After the captains of the two teams met they quickly realized that the games each school played were still
different. In a compromise the teams decided to play two different games, one under each teams set of rules. On
May 14, Harvard won the game under their rules, and the game on the following day, May 15, under McGill's
rules ended in scoreless tie. Harvard would eventually go on to fully adopt the McGill version of the game that
included more carrying of the ball and also used an oblong ball that was easier to carry and throw.
[EBSCOhost 1]
An 1869 game of intercollegiate "football" between Rutgers and Princeton is often cited as the first
intercollegiate American football game, however it was an unfamiliar ancestor of today's college football, as it
was played under 6-year-old soccer-style Association rules.
[2]
The game played between teams from Rutgers
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The Rutgers College football team in
1882.
University and Princeton University, which was called Rutgers College at the time, took place on November 6,
1869 at College Field, which is now the site of the College Avenue Gymnasium at Rutgers University in New
Brunswick, New Jersey. Rutgers won by a score of 6 "runs" to Princeton's 4.
[3][4]
The 1869 game between
Rutgers and Princeton is important in that it is the first documented game of something called intercollegiate
"football" ever played between two American colleges, and because of this, Rutgers refers to itself as The
Birthplace of College Football. It came two years before the founding of the Rugby Football Union in England;
though it must be remembered that rugby had been codified 24 years before this in 1845 and played by many
schools, universities and clubs even before the laws were first put on paper. Although the Rutgers-Princeton
game was undoubtedly different from what we today know as American football, it was the forerunner of what
evolved into American football. Another similar game took place between Rutgers and Columbia University in
1870. The popularity of intercollegiate competition in football would spread throughout the country.
Rugby is adopted by American colleges
Yale, Rutgers, Princeton and Columbia met on October 20, 1873 at the
Fifth Avenue Hotel in New York City to agree on a set of rules and
regulations that would allow them to play a form of football that was
essentially Association football (today often called "soccer" in the US)
in character. Harvard University turned down an invitation to join this
group because they preferred to play a rougher version of football
called "the Boston Game" in which the kicking of a round ball was the
most prominent feature though a player could run with the ball, pass it,
or dribble it (known as babying). The man with the ball could be
tackled, although hitting, tripping, hacking (shin-kicking) and other
unnecessary roughness was prohibited. There was no limit to the number of players, but there were typically ten
to fifteen per side.
Harvard's decision not to join the Yale-Rutgers-Princeton-Columbia association meant that they needed to look
further afield to find football opponents so when a challenge from Canadas McGill University rugby team in
Montreal was issued to Harvard, they accepted. It was agreed that two games would be played on Harvards
Jarvis baseball field in Cambridge, Massachusetts on May 14 and 15, 1874: one to be played under Harvard
rules, another under the stricter rugby regulations of McGill. Harvard beat McGill in the "Boston Game" on the
Thursday and held McGill to a 0-0 tie on the Friday. The Harvard students took to the rugby rules and adopted
them as their own,
[5]
travelling to Montreal to play a further game of rugby in the Fall of the same year winning
by three tries to nil.
Harvard then played Tufts University on June 4, 1875, again at Jarvis Field. Jarvis Field was at the time a patch
of land at the northern point of the Harvard campus, bordered by Everett and Jarvis Streets to the north and
south, and Oxford Street and Massachusetts Avenue to the east and west. The game was won by Tufts 1-0
[6]
and
a report of the outcome of this game appeared in the Boston Daily Globe of June 5, 1875. In this game each side
fielded eleven men, participants were allowed to pick up the inflated egg-shaped ball and run with it and the ball
carrier was stopped by knocking him down or "tackling" him. A photograph of the 1875 Tufts team which hangs
in the College Football Hall of Fame in South Bend, Indiana commemorates this match as the generally accepted
first intercollegiate football game between two US institutions.
[7]
In 1876 at Massasoit House in Springfield, Massachusetts, Harvard persuaded Princeton and Columbia to adopt
an amalgam of rugby's laws and the rules that they were then playing, thus forming the Intercollegiate Football
Association (IFA). Yale initially refused to join this association because of a disagreement over the number of
players to be allowed per team (relenting in 1879) and Rutgers were not invited to the meeting. The rules that
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Walter Camp, the "Father of
American Football", pictured
here in 1878 as the captain of
the Yale Football team
1906 St. Louis
Post-Dispatch drawing of
Brad Robinson, who threw
the first legal forward pass
they agreed upon were essentially those of rugby union at the time with the exception that points be awarded for
scoring a try, not just the conversion afterwards (extra point). Incidentally, rugby was to make a similar change
to its scoring system 10 years later.
Rugby becomes American football
Walter Camp, known as the "Father of American Football", is credited with
changing the game from a variation of rugby into a unique sport. Camp, who was
a rugby coach, decided to come up with a new set of rules to create a game that
was completely different. Camp is responsible for pioneering the play from
scrimmage with initially uncontested possession for the team starting with the
ball (earlier games featured a rugby scrum where possession was contested) and
was also the one who decided that teams should have 4 downs to advance the
ball ten yards. Camp was responsible for the eleven-man team.
[EBSCOhost 1]
Camp also had a hand in popularizing the game. He published numerous articles
in publications such as Collier's Weekly and Harper's Weekly, and he chose the
first College Football All-America Team.
Formation of the NCAA
College football increased in popularity through
the remainder of the 19th century. It also became
increasingly violent. Between 1890 and 1905,
330 college athletes died as a direct result of
injuries sustained on the football field. These
deaths could be attributed to the mass formations
and gang tackling that characterized the sport in
its early years. In 1906, President Theodore Roosevelt organized a meeting
among thirteen school leaders at the White House to find solutions to make the
sport safer for the athletes. Because the college officials could not agree upon a
change in rules, it was decided over the course of several subsequent meetings
that an external governing body should be responsible. Resulting from this
conference was the formation of the Intercollegiate Athletic Association of the
United States in 1906. The IAAUS was the original rule making body of college
football, but would go on to sponsor championships in other sports. The IAAUS
would get its current name of National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA),
in 1910 which still sets rules governing the sport.
[8]
The rules committee
considered widening the playing field to "open up" the game, but Harvard Stadium (the first large permanent
football stadium) had recently been built at great expense; it would be rendered useless by a wider field. The
rules committee legalized the forward pass instead. The first legal pass was thrown by Bradbury Robinson on
September 5, 1906, playing for coach Eddie Cochems, who developed an early but sophisticated passing offense
at Saint Louis University. Another rule change banned "mass momentum" plays (many of which, like the
infamous "flying wedge", were sometimes literally deadly).
Even after the emergence of the professional National Football League (NFL), college football remained
extremely popular throughout the U.S.
[9]
Although the college game has a much larger margin for talent than its
pro counterpart, the sheer number of fans following major colleges provides a financial equalizer for the game,
with Division I programs the highest level playing in huge stadiums, six of which have seating capacity
exceeding 100,000. In many cases, college stadiums employ bench-style seating, as opposed to individual seats
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A night game between Harvard and
Brown, September 25, 2009
with backs and arm rests. This allows them to seat more fans in a given amount of space than the typical
professional stadium, which tends to have more features and comforts for fans. (Only two stadiums owned by
U.S. colleges or universitiesPapa John's Cardinal Stadium at the University of Louisville and FAU Stadium at
Florida Atlantic Universityconsist entirely of chairback seating.)
College athletes, unlike players in the NFL, are not permitted by the NCAA to be paid salaries. Colleges are
only allowed to provide non-monetary compensation such as athletic scholarships that provide for tuition,
housing, and books.
[10]
Although rules for the high school, college, and NFL games are generally
consistent, there are several minor differences. The NCAA Football
Rules Committee determines the playing rules for Division I (both Bowl
and Championship Subdivisions), II, and III games (the National
Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) is a separate
organization, but uses the NCAA rules).
A pass is ruled complete if one of the receiver's feet is inbounds at
the time of the catch. In the NFL both feet must be inbounds.
A player is considered down when any part of his body other than
the feet or hands touches the ground or when the ball carrier is
tackled or otherwise falls and loses possession of the ball as he contacts the ground with any part of his
body, with the sole exception of the holder for field goal and extra point attempts. In the NFL a player is
active until he is tackled or forced down by a member of the opposing team (down by contact).
The clock stops after the offense completes a first down and begins againassuming it is following a play
in which the clock would not normally stoponce the referee says the ball is ready for play. In the NFL
the clock does not explicitly stop for a first down.
Overtime was introduced in 1996, eliminating ties. When a game goes to overtime, each team is given one
possession from its opponent's twenty-five yard line with no game clock, despite the one timeout per
period and use of play clock. The team leading after both possessions is declared the winner. If the teams
remain tied, overtime periods continue, with a coin flip determining the first possession. Possessions
alternate with each overtime, until one team leads the other at the end of the overtime. Starting with the
third overtime, a one point PAT field goal after a touchdown is no longer allowed, forcing teams to
attempt a two-point conversion after a touchdown. (In the NFL overtime is decided by a 15-minute
sudden-death quarter, and regular season games can still end in a tie if neither team scores. Overtime for
regular season games in the NFL began with the 1974 season. In the post-season, if the teams are still tied,
teams will play additional overtime periods until either team scores.)
Extra point tries are attempted from the three-yard line. The NFL uses the two-yard line. This counts as
one point. Teams can also go for "the two-point conversion" which is when a team will line up at the
three-yard line and try to score. If they are successful, they receive two points, if they are not, then they
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receive zero points. The two-point conversion was not implemented in the NFL until 1994, but it had been
previously used in the old American Football League (AFL) before it merged with the NFL in 1970.
The defensive team may score two points on a point-after touchdown attempt by returning a blocked kick,
fumble, or interception into the opposition's end zone. In addition, if the defensive team gains possession,
but then moves backwards into the endzone and is stopped, a one point safety will be awarded to the
offense, although, unlike a real safety, the offense kicks off, opposed to the team charged with the safety.
This college rule was added in 1988. In the NFL, a conversion attempt ends when the defending team
gains possession of the football.
The two-minute warning is not used in college football, except in rare cases where the scoreboard clock
has malfunctioned and is not being used.
There is an option to use instant replay review of officiating decisions. Division I FBS (formerly Division
I-A) schools use replay in virtually all games; replay is rarely used in lower division games. Every play is
subject to booth review with coaches only having one challenge. In the NFL, only scoring plays,
turnovers, the final 2:00 of each half and all overtime periods are reviewed, and coaches are issued two
challenges (with the option for a 3rd if the first two are successful).
Starting in the 2012 season, the ball is placed on the 25-yard line following a touchback on a kickoff. At
all other levels of football, plus all other touchback situations under NCAA rules, the ball is placed on the
20.
Among other rule changes in 2007, kickoffs were moved from the 35-yard line back five yards to the
30-yard line, matching a change that the NFL had made in 1994. Some coaches and officials questioned
this rule change as it could lead to more injuries to the players as there will likely be more kickoff
returns.
[11]
The rationale for the rule change was to help reduce dead time in the game.
[12]
The NFL
returned its kickoff location to the 35-yard line effective in 2011; college football did not do so until 2012.
Several changes were made to college rules in 2011, all of which differ from NFL practice:
[13]
if a player is penalized for unsportsmanlike conduct for actions that occurred during a play ending
in a touchdown by that team, but before the goal line was crossed, the touchdown will be nullified.
In the NFL, the same foul would result in a penalty on the conversion attempt or ensuing kickoff, at
the option of the non-penalized team.
If a team is penalized in the final minute of a half and the penalty causes the clock to stop, the
opposing team now has the right to have 10 seconds run off the clock in addition to the yardage
penalty. The NFL has a similar rule in the final minute of the half, but it applies only to specified
violations against the offensive team. The new NCAA rule applies to penalties on both sides of the
ball.
Players lined up outside the tackle boxmore specifically, those lined up more than 7 yards from
the centerwill now be allowed to block below the waist only if they are blocking straight ahead or
toward the nearest sideline.
On placekicks, no offensive lineman can now be engaged by more than two defensive players. A
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violation will be a 5-yard penalty.
College teams mostly play other similarly sized schools through the NCAA's divisional system. Division I
generally consists of the major collegiate athletic powers with larger budgets, more elaborate facilities, and more
athletic scholarships. Division II primarily consists of smaller public and private institutions that offer fewer
scholarships than those in Division I. Division III institutions also field teams, but do not offer any scholarships.
Football teams in Division I are further divided into the Bowl Subdivision (consisting of the largest programs)
and the Championship Subdivision. The Bowl Subdivision does not have an organized tournament to determine
its champion, and instead teams compete in post-season bowl games.
Teams in each of these four divisions are further divided into various regional conferences.
College football national championships in NCAA Division I FBS - Overview of systems for determining
national champions at the highest level of college football from 1869 to present.
College Football Playoff - 4 team playoff system for determining national champions at the highest
level of college football beginning in 2014.
Bowl Championship Series - The primary method of determining the national champion at the
highest level of college football from 1998-2013; preceded by the Bowl Alliance (1995-1997) and
the Bowl Coalition (1992-1994).
NCAA Division I Football Championship
[14]
- playoff for determining the national champion at the
second highest level of college football, Division I FCS, from 1978 to present.
NCAA Division I FCS Consensus Mid-Major Football National Championship - awarded by poll
from 2001- to 2007 for a subset of the second highest level of play in college football, FCS.
NCAA Division II National Football Championship - playoff for determining the national champion at the
third highest level of college football from 1973 to present.
NCAA Division III National Football Championship - playoff for determining the national champion at
the fourth highest level of college football from 1973 to present.
NAIA National Football Championship -playoff for determining the national champions of college
football governed by the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics.
NJCAA National Football Championship - playoff for determining the national champions of college
football governed by the National Junior College Athletic Association.
CSFL Championship - Champions of the Collegiate Sprint Football League, a weight restricted football
sport.
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Updated Map of NCAA FBS Schools (http://fieldgoal.squarespace.com/storage/Map%203-20-14.pdf)
Map of BCS
participants

Map of Division I (A)
FBS

Map of Division I (AA)
FCS

Map of NCAA
Division II
Map of NCAA
Division III

Map of NAIA

Map of NJCAA

Map of CCCAA
Starting in the 2014 season, the four Division I FBS teams will be selected at the end of regular season to
compete in a playoff for the FBS national championship. The College Football Playoff will replace the Bowl
Championship Series, which had been used as the selection method to determine the national championship
game participants starting in the 1998 season.
At the Division I FCS level, the teams participate in a 24-team playoff (most recently expanded from 20 teams
in 2013) to determine the national championship. Under the current playoff structure, the top eight teams are all
seeded, and receive a bye week in the first round. The highest seed receives automatic home field advantage.
Starting in 2013, non-seeded teams can only host a playoff game if both teams involved are unseeded; in such a
matchup, the schools must bid for the right to host the game. Selection for the playoffs is determined by a
selection committee, although usually a team must have a 7-4 record to even be considered. Losses to an FBS
team count against their playoff eligibility, while wins against a Division II opponent do not count towards
playoff consideration. Thus, only Division I wins (whether FBS, FCS, or FCS non-scholarship) are considered
for playoff selection. The Division I National Championship game is held in Frisco, Texas.
Division II and Division III of the NCAA also participate in their own respective playoffs, crowning national
champions at the end of the season. The National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics also holds a playoff.
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Number of bowl games per state for the 2010-2011
season.
Unlike other college football divisions and most other sports
collegiate or professionalthe Football Bowl
Subdivision, formerly known as Division I-A college
football, has historically not employed a playoff system to
determine a champion. Instead, it has a series of postseason
"bowl games". The annual National Champion in the
Football Bowl Subdivision is then instead traditionally
determined by a vote of sports writers and other
non-players. This system has been challenged often,
beginning with an NCAA committee proposal in 1979 to
have a four-team playoff following the bowl games.
[15]
However, little headway was made in instituting a playoff
tournament until 2014, given the entrenched vested
economic interests in the various bowls. Although the
NCAA publishes lists of claimed FBS-level national
champions in its official publications, it has never recognized an official FBS national championship; this policy
will continue even after the establishment of the College Football Playoff (which will not be directly run by the
NCAA) in 2014. As a result, the official Division I National Champion is the winner of the Football
Championship Subdivision, as it is the highest level of football with an NCAA-administered championship
tournament.
The first bowl game was the 1902 Rose Bowl, played between Michigan and Stanford; Michigan won 49-0. It
ended when Stanford requested and Michigan agreed to end it with 8 minutes on the clock. That game was so
lopsided that the game was not played annually until 1916, when the Tournament of Roses decided to reattempt
the postseason game. The term "bowl" originates from the shape of the Rose Bowl stadium in Pasadena,
California, which was built in 1923 and resembled the Yale Bowl, built in 1915. This is where the name came
into use, as it became known as the Rose Bowl Game. Other games came along and used the term "bowl",
whether the stadium was shaped like a bowl or not.
At the Division I FBS level, teams must earn the right to be bowl eligible by winning at least 6 games during the
season (teams that play 13 games in a season, which is allowed for Hawaii and any of its home opponents, must
win 7 games). They are then invited to a bowl game based on their conference ranking and the tie-ins that the
conference has to each bowl game. For the 2009 season, there were 34 bowl games, so 68 of the 120 Division I
FBS teams were invited to play at a bowl. These games are played from mid-December to early January and
most of the later bowl games are typically considered more prestigious.
After the Bowl Championship Series, additional all-star bowl games round out the post-season schedule through
the beginning of February.
Bowl Championship Series
Partly as a compromise between both bowl game and playoff supporters, the NCAA created the Bowl
Championship Series (BCS) in 1998 in order to create a definitive National Championship game for college
football. The series included the four most prominent bowl games (Rose Bowl, Orange Bowl, Sugar Bowl, Fiesta
Bowl), while the National Championship game rotated each year between one of these venues. If, for example,
the Rose Bowl was to be played as the National Championship one year, the other three games of the series
followed their normal procedures for picking teams, such as considering conference champions and at-large
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bids. The ACC, Big Ten, Big 12, Big East, Pac-12, and SEC champions were all guaranteed a spot in one of the
BCS games, while the remaining spots went to at-large teams.
The BCS selection committee used a complicated, and often controversial, computer system to rank all Division
1-FBS teams and the top two teams at the end of the season played for the National Championship. This
computer system, which factored in newspaper polls, online polls, coaches' polls, strength of schedule, and
various other factors of a team's season, led to much dispute over whether the two best teams in the country
were being selected to play in the National Championship game. The BCS system was slightly adjusted in 2006,
as the NCAA added a fifth game to the series, called the National Championship Game. This allowed the four
other BCS bowls to use their normal selection process to select the teams in their games while the top two teams
in the BCS rankings would play in the new National Championship Game.
The BCS ended after the 2013 season and, starting in the 2014 season, the FBS national champion will be
determined by a four team playoff known as the College Football Playoff (CFP). A committee of college
football experts will decide the teams.
College football is a highly controversial institution within American higher education, where the amount of
money involved -- what people will pay for the entertainment provided -- is a corrupting factor within
universities that they are usually ill-equipped to deal with.
[16][17]
According to William E. Kirwan, chancellor of
the University of Maryland System and co-director of the Knight Commission on Intercollegiate Athletics,
"We've reached a point where big-time intercollegiate athletics is undermining the integrity of our institutions,
diverting presidents and institutions from their main purpose."
[18]
Football coaches often make more than the
presidents of their universities which employ them.
[19]
Athletes are alleged to receive preferential treatment both
in academics and when they run afoul of the law.
[20]
Although in theory football is an extra-curricular activity
engaged in as a sideline by students, so much money is made by everyone except the students that it has been
seriously proposed to turn them into employees by paying them.
[21][22][23][24]
Canadian football, which parallels American football, is played by collegiate teams in Canada under the
auspices of Canadian Interuniversity Sport. (Unlike in the United States, no junior colleges play football in
Canada, and the sanctioning body for junior college athletics in Canada, CCAA, does not sanction the sport.)
Organized competition in American football also exists at the collegiate level in Mexico (ONEFA), the UK
(British Universities American Football League), Japan (Japan American Football Association, Koshien Bowl),
and South Korea (Korea American Football Association).
Heisman Trophy
Maxwell Award
Walter Camp Award
Outland Trophy
Bronko Nagurski Trophy
Dick Butkus Award
Jim Thorpe Award
Doak Walker Award
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