Our first rankings - pro and FCS version!

In keeping with the College Football Playoff committee's first rankings coming out tomorrow evening, we also wait until now to actually rank our (American) football teams - until there's a truly legitimate body of work to evaluate with. Yesterday, we posted the FBS list (check the previous post out), and now here's the NFL and FCS (Division 1-AA) rosters, still utilizing tiers as we have all year (that's how we determine point spreads), but also including rankings for the top thirty or so and the bottom sixteen...

In the NFL, following the Broncos' upset of the Packers last night, there's a definitive #1...

Tier A) 1. New England Patriots (7-0) - 2. Cincinnati Bengals (7-0) - 3. Carolina Panthers (6-0) - 4. Denver Broncos (7-0).
Tier B) 5. Green Bay Packers (6-1) - 6. Arizona Cardinals (5-2) - 7. Seattle Seahawks (4-3).
Tier C) 8. St. Louis Rams (4-3) - 9. Minnesota Vikings (5-2) - 10. Pittsburgh Steelers (4-4) - 11. Kansas City Chiefs (3-5) - 12. Atlanta Falcons (6-2).
Tier D) 13. Philadelphia Eagles (3-4) - 14. Buffalo Bills (3-4) - 15. Oakland Raiders (4-3).
Tier E) 16. New York Jets (4-3) - 17. Baltimore Ravens (2-6) - 18. San Diego Chargers (2-6) - 19. New Orleans Saints (4-4).
Tier F) 20. Washington Redskins (3-4) - 21. New York Giants (4-4) - 22. Miami Dolphins (3-4) - 23. Dallas Cowboys (2-5) - 24. Tampa Bay Buccaneers (3-4).
Tier G) 25. Chicago Bears (2-5) - 26. San Francisco 49ers (2-6) - 27. Houston Texans (3-5) - 28. Cleveland Browns (2-6) - 29. Jacksonville Jaguars (2-5).
Tier H) 30. Indianapolis Colts (3-4) - 31. Detroit Lions (1-7) - 32. Tennessee Titans (1-6).

And in the FCS, there's just one team in the top tier - the one who took the Auburn Tigers to overtime on the road... (Note that we've combined all 1-AA conferences into this one ranking for a change. We'll single out the others afterwards.) Remember that all these tiers match with the FBS tiers, so in theory a team in Tier L here is equal to a Tier L team on the FBS list, and vice versa. We've ranked the top 28 and the bottom 16; the rest are in random order within their tiers as usual:

Tier L) 1. Jacksonville St (5-0 ovc, 7-1 overall).
Tier M) 2. Illinois St (5-0 mvc, 7-1) - 3. North Dakota St (4-1 mvc, 6-2).
Tier N) 4. Southern Utah (5-0 big sky, 6-2) - 5. Portland St (4-1 bgsky, 7-1) - 6. South Dakota St (3-2 mvc, 6-2).
Tier O) 7. Chattanooga (5-0 sthn, 7-1) - 8. Youngstown St (2-3 mvc, 4-4) - 9. McNeese St (7-0 sthld, 8-0) - 10. Harvard (4-0 ivy, 7-0) - 11. Sam Houston St (5-1 sthld, 6-2) - 12. William & Mary (4-1 caa, 6-2) - 13. James Madison (4-2 caa, 7-2) - 14. Northern Iowa (2-3 mvc, 4-4) - 15. Coastal Carolina (2-1 bgsth, 7-1) - 16. Western Illinois (3-2 mvc, 4-4).
Tier P) 17. Indiana St (2-3 mvc, 4-4) - 18. The Citadel (5-0 sthrn, 6-2) - 19. Southern Illinois (2-3 mvc, 3-5) - 20. Eastern Kentucky (4-1 ovc, 5-3).
Tier Q) 21. Charleston Southern (4-0 bgsth, 7-1) - 22. Dartmouth (3-1 ivy, 6-1) - 23. Eastern Washington (5-0 bgsky, 6-2) - 24. Eastern Illinois (5-0 ovc, 5-3).
Tier R) 25. Richmond (5-0 caa, 7-1) - 26. Montana (3-2 bgsky, 4-4) - 27. Montana St (2-3 bgsky, 4-4) - 28. Cal Poly SLO (1-4 bgsky, 2-6).

Tier S) Northern Arizona (3-2 bgsky, 5-3); Towson (3-2 caa, 5-3); UT-Martin (4-1 ovc, 5-3); Central Arkansas (5-1 sthld, 6-2); North Carolina A&T (5-0 meac, 7-1); Alcorn St (4-1 swac, 5-2); Fordham (3-1 patr, 7-2); Furman (2-2 sthrn, 4-4).
Tier T) Bethune-Cookman (5-1 meac, 7-2); North Dakota (3.3 bgsky, 5-4); Liberty (1-2 bgsth, 4-4); Villanova (3-2 caa, 4-4); New Hampshire (2-3 caa, 4-4); SE Louisiana (3-3 sthld, 4-4), South Carolina St (4-1 meac, 5-3).
Tier U) Dayton (5-0 pfl, 8-0); Weber St (3-3 bgsky, 4-5); SE Missouri St (2-2 ovc, 3-5); Tennessee St (0-4 ovc, 4-4); Lamar (3-3 sthld, 4-4); Grambling St (6-0 swac, 6-2).
Tier V) Samford (1-4 sthrn, 3-5); Jacksonville (3-2 pfl, 6-2); Penn (3-1 ivy, 4-3); Princeton (2-2 ivy, 5-2); Western Carolina (3-2 sthrn, 5-3).
Tier W) Wofford (2-3 sthrn, 4-5); Stephen F Austin (3-3 sthld, 3-5); Colgate (3-0 patr, 4-4); Elon (2-3 caa, 3-5); Delaware (2-3 caa, 3-5); Stony Brook (1-5 caa, 2-5); Bryant (2-1 nec, 4-4), San Diego (4-1 pfl, 6-2); Yale (1-3 ivy, 4-3).
Tier X) Idaho St (1-4 bgsky, 2-6); Maine (3-2 caa, 3-5); Mercer (0-4 sthrn, 3-5); NW State (2-4 sthld, 2-6); Abilene Christian (2-5 sthld, 2-6); Lehigh (2-1 patr, 4-4); Holy Cross (1-2 patr, 4-4); Hampton (3-3 meac, 4-5); Prairie View A&M (5-1 swac, 5-2); Southern (4-2 swac, 4-4).
Tier Y) Kennesaw St (2-1 bgsth, 6-2); Northern Colorado (2-4 bgsky, 4-4); Sacramento St (1-4 bgsky, 2-6); Duquesne (3-1 nec, 6-3); St Francis (2-1 nec, 4-3); Murray St (1-4 ovc, 2-6); Tennessee Tech (1-5 ovc, 2-6); Bucknell (1-2 patr, 4-4); North Carolina Central (4-1 meac, 5-3); Morgan St (3-2 meac, 3-4); Norfolk St (2-3 meac, 2-6), Monmouth (1-3 bgsth, 3-6).
Tier Z) Alabama A&M (2-3 swac, 2-5); Albany (1-4 caa, 2-6); Rhode Island (1-4 caa, 1-7); Sacred Heart (1-2 nec, 4-4); Drake (3-3 pfl, 4-5); Columbia (1-3 ivy, 2-5); Georgetown (2-2 patr, 4-5); Alabama St (4-3 swac, 4-4).
Tier "a" (lowercase) UC Davis (1-4 bgsky, 1-7); Missouri St (0-5 mvc, 1-7); Central Connecticut St (3-1 nec, 4-5); Morehead St (4-1 pfl, 5-3); Marist (3-2 pfl, 4-4), Campbell (3-3 pfl, 5-4); Brown (2-2 ivy, 4-4); Jackson St (3-3 swac, 3-5); Gardner-Webb (2-2 bgsth, 3-5); VMI (1-4 sthrn, 2-7).
Tier "b") Presbyterian (0-3 bgsth, 1-7), Butler (2-3 pfl, 4-4); Howard (1-5 meac, 1-7); Texas Southern (2-4 swac, 3-4); Incarnate Word (3-3 sthld, 4-4)

And, without further ado, the Bottom Sixteen...

Tier "c") 110. Nicholls St (1-5 sthld, 1-7) - 111. Florida A&M (1-4 meac, 1-7) - 112. Austin Peay (0-6 ovc, 0-9).
Tier "d") 113. Lafayette (0-4 patr, 1-8) - 114. Cornell (0-4 ivy, 0-7) - 115. Wagner (0-3 nec, 0-8) - 116. Delaware St (0-5 meac, 0-8).
Tier "e") 117. Robert Morris (1-3 nec, 2-6) - 118. Arkansas Pine Bluff (0-6 swac, 1-7) - 119. Stetson (1-5 pfl, 2-6).
Tier "f") 120.  Savannah St (1-4 meac, 1-6) - 121. Houston Baptist (0-6 sthld, 1-7) - 122. East Tennessee St (0-0 sthrn, officially; 1-7 overall) - 123. Mississippi Valley St (0-7 swac, 0-9) - 124. Valparaiso (1-4 pfl, 1-6).
Tier "g") 125. Davidson (0-5 pfl, 1-7).

If you're wondering, when you get towards the bottom, some or most of those out-of-conference wins are against teams in lower divisions - after all, "bottom" is in the eye of the beholder!

Within the Intramural Division, your top three are:
1. Harvard (tier O) - 2. Dartmouth (tier Q) - 3. Fordham (Tier S),
... and your bottom three are:
1. Cornell (tier d) - 2. Lafayette (tier d) - 3. Brown (tier a). 

And, within the Historically Black College division, your top three are:
1. North Carolina A&T (tier S) - 2. Alcorn St (tier S) - 3. Bethune Cookman (tier T),
...and your bottom three are:
1. Mississippi Valley St (tier f) - 2. Savannah St (tier f) - 3. Arkansas Pine Bluff (tier e).

Here are the new FCS tiers after the fourth week...

For starters, here are the teams from the nine conferences who actually participate in the "Football Championship Subdivision" championship... the highest tier is Tier N, lining up with tier N within the FBS (meaning we think they match up evenly with those teams), and the lowest is Tier "d", lower case, which would be four levels below capital Z. (We've stretched these groups out two more rungs since last week, which is why we didn't publish them with the FBS teams last night.)

FF tier	Team	Conference	Conf Record		Overall Record
N	Jacksonville State	ovc	1	0	2	1
N	North Dakota State	mvc	0	0	2	1
N	Northern Iowa	mvc	0	0	2	1
N	Portland State	b-sky	1	0	2	0
N	South Dakota State	mvc	0	0	2	0
O	Coastal Carolina	b-sou	0	0	3	0
O	Illinois State	mvc	0	0	2	1
O	Liberty	b-sou	0	0	2	1
O	Montana	b-sky	0	1	1	2
O	South Dakota	mvc	0	0	2	1
O	William & Mary	caa	0	0	1	1
P	Chattanooga	sthrn	1	0	2	1
P	Eastern Kentucky	ovc	0	0	1	1
P	James Madison	caa	1	0	3	0
P	Montana State	b-sky	0	0	1	1
P	Southern Illinois	mvc	0	0	0	2
P	Western Illinois	mvc	0	0	1	2
Q	Cal Poly SLO	b-sky	1	0	1	2
Q	Eastern Illinois	ovc	0	0	0	3
Q	Eastern Washington	b-sky	1	0	2	2
Q	Indiana State	mvc	0	0	2	1
Q	Southern Utah	b-sky	1	0	1	2
R	Lamar	s-land	1	0	2	1
R	Northern Arizona	b-sky	0	0	2	1
R	Sam Houston St	s-land	0	1	0	2
R	Stony Brook	caa	1	0	2	0
R	Youngstown State	mvc	0	0	2	1
S	Furman	sthrn	0	0	1	2
S	New Hampshire	caa	0	1	1	2
S	North Dakota	b-sky	0	0	2	1
S	SE Missouri State	ovc	0	0	1	2
S	Weber State	b-sky	1	0	1	2
T	Charleston Southern	b-sou	0	0	2	1
T	McNeese State	s-land	2	0	2	0
T	Samford	sthrn	0	1	2	1
T	SE Louisiana	s-land	1	0	2	1
T	Towson	caa	0	0	2	1
U	Central Arkansas	s-land	0	0	0	2
U	Idaho State	b-sky	0	1	1	3
U	Richmond	caa	0	0	2	1
U	Tennessee State	ovc	0	1	2	1
U	Wofford	sthrn	0	0	1	2
V	Abilene Christian	s-land	1	0	1	1
V	Bryant	nec	0	0	2	0
V	Jacksonville	pion	0	0	2	0
V	UT-Martin	ovc	0	0	1	1
V	Villanova	caa	1	0	2	1
W	Dayton	pion	0	0	1	0
W	Delaware	caa	0	1	1	2
W	Drake	pion	0	0	1	1
W	Elon	caa	0	0	1	2
W	Stephen F Austin	s-land	0	1	0	3
W	Tennessee Tech	ovc	0	0	1	2
X	Albany	caa	1	1	1	2
X	Mercer	sthrn	0	0	2	1
X	Northwestern St	s-land	0	1	0	3
X	Presbyterian	b-sou	0	0	1	2
X	The Citadel	sthrn	1	0	2	1
Y	Duquesne	nec	0	0	2	1
Y	Monmouth	b-sou	0	0	1	2
Y	Morehead State	pion	0	0	0	2
Y	Sacramento State	b-sky	0	2	1	3
Y	San Diego	pion	0	0	1	1
Y	VMI	sthrn	0	0	1	2
Z	Murray State	ovc	0	0	1	2
Z	Northern Colorado	b-sky	0	1	2	1
Z	Sacred Heart	nec	0	0	2	1
Z	UC Davis	b-sky	0	0	0	3
Z	Western Carolina	sthrn	0	1	1	2
a	Gardner-Webb	b-sou	0	0	1	2
a	Marist	pion	0	0	0	2
a	Missouri State	mvc	0	0	1	2
a	Robert Morris	nec	0	0	1	2
a	St. Francis - PA	nec	0	0	1	2
b	Butler	pion	0	0	1	1
b	Campbell	pion	0	0	2	0
b	Kennesaw St	b-sou	0	0	3	0
b	Maine	caa	0	0	0	2
b	Wagner	nec	0	0	0	2
c	Austin Peay	ovc	0	0	0	3
c	Central Connecticut	nec	0	0	1	2
c	Incarnate Word	s-land	1	1	2	2
c	Rhode Island	caa	0	1	0	3
c	Stetson	pion	0	0	1	1
d	Davidson	pion	0	0	0	2
d	East Tennessee St*	sthrn	0	0	0	3
d	Houston Baptist	s-land	0	1	1	2
d	Nicholls State	s-land	0	1	0	2
d	Valparaiso	pion	0	0	0	2

Next, we look at the two conferences who choose not to play a post-season with the rest of the FCS, but rather hold their own "Celebration Bowl", matching the titlists of the two Historically Black College conferences (the SWAC and the MEAC:

FF tier	Team	Conference	Conf Record		OverallRecord
S	SC State	meac	1	0	2	1
T	Southern	swacW	2	0	2	1
U	Bethune-Cookman	meac	0	0	2	1
V	Alcorn State	swacE	2	0	2	1
V	Grambling St	swacW	1	0	1	2
W	NC A&T	meac	0	0	2	1
X	Hampton	meac	1	0	2	1
X	Morgan State	meac	0	0	1	2
X	Norfolk State	meac	0	0	0	3
X	Alabama State	swacE	0	2	0	3
Y	NC Central	meac	0	0	1	2
Y	Alabama A&M	swacE	0	1	0	2
Z	Florida A&M	meac	0	1	0	3
Z	Jackson State	swacE	0	1	0	3
a	Howard	meac	0	1	0	3
a	Texas Southern	swacW	1	1	2	1
b	Prairie View A&M	swacW	2	0	2	1
b	Ark-Pine Bluff	swacW	0	1	1	2
c	Delaware State	meac	0	0	0	3
c	Miss Valley St	swacE	0	2	0	3
d	Savannah State	meac	0	0	0	2

And finally, the two conferences who choose not to compete in a post-season for academic reasons, the Ivy League and the Patriot League:

FF tier	Team	Conference	Conf Record		OverallRecord
R	Dartmouth	ivy	0	0	1	0
S	Fordham	patr	0	0	2	1
T	Harvard	ivy	0	0	1	0
U	Colgate	patr	0	0	0	3
V	Princeton	ivy	0	0	1	0
W	Yale	ivy	0	0	1	0
W	Holy Cross	patr	0	0	1	1
X	Lehigh	patr	0	0	2	1
Y	Penn	ivy	0	0	0	1
Y	Bucknell	patr	0	0	2	1
Z	Georgetown	patr	0	0	1	2
Z	Lafayette	patr	0	0	0	3
a	Brown	ivy	0	0	0	1
b	Cornell	ivy	0	0	0	1
c	Columbia	ivy	0	0	0	1

Ratings and Tiers on a Monday Morning...post Labor Day

Here are the current records and ratings as we move in the fall - with three countries in three different parts of their seasons:

Down under, in Australia, the season is over and the Finals start this weekend! Eight of our top nine rated teams are the eight teams in the playoffs, and the ninth place team (Port Adelaide) finished with a flurry to tie for sixth in the ratings, just a game out of contention. Here are the seedings, the games this weekend, and how our Following Football Ratings compare:

1. Hawthorn (85.7), seeded third, travelling to Perth to play on Saturday against...
2. West Coast (84.7), seeded second, in a blockbuster of a Qualifying Final. 
3. Sydney (76.7), seeded fourth, also flying west for a Qualifying Final at Fremantle.
4. Richmond (72.7), seeded fifth, hosting an Elimination Final against North Melbourne.
5. Adelaide (70.8), seeded seventh, travels to Western in the other Elimination Final.
6. Fremantle (62.9), slumping but still seeded first, hosting Sydney in a Qualifying Final.
8. North Melbourne (62.5) goes to Richmond as the eighth seed, and
9. Western Bulldogs (61.7), hosts Adelaide as the sixth seed. 
--> In the Elimination Final, as the name suggests, the loser is eliminated, and the winner goes on. But in the Qualifying Final, the top four teams play each other: the losers plays the winners of the elimination games, and the winners get next week off and play the survivors of those matches for the chance at the title in the Grand Final. That's why being top four is so important in the AFL: that "double chance" has meant that no team from below fourth place has won Grand Finals in twenty years! You can see who's hot and who's struggling right now: as good as Freo was early, they've been ordinary the last two months; while Hawthorn and West Coast are definitively the best teams going right now - and have to play each other right off the bat. It would NOT surprise us to see them meet again in three weeks at the MCG in the last game of the year...

In Canada, we're halfway through the season, and the ratings are lining up more and more with the standings:

1. Hamilton (43.9) leads the East at 7-3.
2. Calgary (40.4) leads the West at 8-2. 
3. Edmonton (34.7) is two games back of Calgary at 6-4.
4. Montreal (30.9) is climbing and hot, even though they're still just 4-6.
5. BC Lions (28.0) moved up with a big win this weekend, passing...
6. Toronto (27.1), who sits in second at 6-4 in the East.
7. Saskatchewan (25.0) finally won a game and sits 1-9, but they've been close all along!
8. Ottawa (21.6) continues to progress, having started the year at 10. (They're 5-4.)
9. Winnipeg (18.9) sits at 3-7, floundering on most fronts.

In the US, of course, we're just getting started! We consider it far too early to rank teams - preseason polls are counterproductive, in our opinion. However, we do take it upon ourselves to group teams into tiers, for prognostication purposes, so we have something we can base our predictions on. So, here are our tiers for the NFL, the FBS, and the FCS, as of September 8th, 2015:

NFL - Tier I: New England, Baltimore, Pittsburgh, Indianapolis, Denver, Dallas, Philadelphia, Green Bay, Seattle, and Arizona.
Tier II: Buffalo, Miami, Cincinnati, Houston, San Diego, Kansas City, NY Giants, Detroit, Minnesota, Carolina, New Orleans, Atlanta, and St. Louis.
Tier III: NY Jets, Cleveland, Jacksonville, Tennessee, Oakland, Washington, Chicago, Tampa, and San Francisco.

FBS ("Division 1A"): Tier I: Clemson, Florida St, Georgia Tech, Michigan St, Baylor, Oklahoma, UCLA, USC, Utah, Georgia, Missouri, Tennessee, Arkansas, Auburn, LSU, Ole Miss, Louisville, NC St, Wisconsin, Oregon, Miami-FL, TCU, Boise St, Arizona St, Mississippi St, Ohio St, Notre Dame, Alabama, and Texas A&M.
Tier II: Temple, Houston, Navy, Boston College, North Carolina, Michigan, Iowa, Nebraska, Northwestern, Kansas St, Louisiana Tech, BYU, Colorado St, Stanford, Florida, South Carolina, Appalachian St, Cincinnati, Maryland, Illinois, Iowa St, Oklahoma St, Texas, Western Kentucky, Northern Illinois, San Diego St, California, Kentucky, Memphis, Duke, Virginia Tech, Minnesota, West Virginia, Marshall, Washington, and Arizona.
Tier III: East Carolina, U Conn, Wake Forest, Pitt, Virginia, Indiana, Penn St, Rutgers, Kansas, Texas Tech, Middle Tennessee, Rice, Southern Miss, UTEP, UTSA, Bowling Green, Toledo, Western Michigan, New Mexico, Utah St, Fresno St, Hawai'i, Nevada, Oregon St, Arkansas St, Texas St, UCF, USF, Syracuse, FIU, Old Dominion, Ohio, U Mass, UNLV, Georgia Southern, Purdue, Central Michigan, Air Force, San Jose St, Vanderbilt, and UL-Lafayette.
Tier IV: SMU, Tulsa, FAU, Army-WP, Akron, Wyoming, New Mexico St, South Alabama, Troy, UL-Monroe, Tulane, Kent St, Georgia St, Idaho, Charlotte, North Texas, Buffalo, Miami-OH, Ball St, Eastern Michigan, Washington St and Colorado.

FCS ("Division 1-AA") - The numbers are designed to line up with the FBS schools - generally, the top tier here matches Tier III in the FBS, so we number these III through VI for now:
Tier III: North Dakota St, Montana, Montana St, Southern Utah, James Madison, Illinois St, South Dakota St, Southern Illinois, Youngstown St, Western Kentucky, Sam Houston St, Idaho St, Northern Arizona, Portland St, New Hampshire, William & Mary, Eastern Illinois, SE Louisiana, Chattanooga, Eastern Washington, Western Illinois and Jacksonville St.
Tier IV: North Dakota, Weber St, Charleston Southern, Towson, Missouri St, South Dakota, Bryant, St Francis-PA, SE Missouri St, Tennessee St, Tennessee Tech, UT-Martin, Drake, Jacksonville, Abilene Christian, Northwestern St-LA, Stephen F Austin, Sacramento St, Wofford, Gardner-Webb, Presbyterian, Dayton, San Diego, Central Arkansas, Furman, Cal Poly SLO, Coastal Carolina, Liberty, Richmond, Villanova, Northern Iowa, and Samford.
Tier V: UC Davis, Delaware, Stony Brook, Duquesne, Sacred Heart, Wagner, Murray St, Campbell, Marist, Morehead St, Stetson, Lamar, McNeese St, Mercer, The Citadel, Western Carolina, Northern Colorado, Albany, Central Connecticut, Monmouth and Maine.
Tier VI: Elon, Rhode Island, Austin Peay, Davidson, Valparaiso, Incarnate Word, Nicholls St, E Tennessee St, Kennesaw St, Robert Morris, Butler, Houston Baptist and VMI.

Also technically in the FCS are the Ivy and Patriot Leagues, but since they choose not to compete in the championships, we've dubbed them the intramural division of 1-AA, and ranked them separately (these rankings still mesh with the FBS and other FCS tiers, however): 
Tier IV: Harvard, Bucknell, Colgate, Fordham, Dartmouth, Yale, and Holy Cross.
Tier V: Brown, Penn, Princeton, Georgetown, Lehigh and Lafayette.
Tier VI: Columbia and Cornell. [Remember, the Ivy League hasn't played a game yet, so these are guesses based on past performance so far.]

Finally, there's the HBC, or the Historically Black Colleges, who also chose not to participate in the championships so they could have one of their own on ESPN! Here are their tiers after one game:
Tier IV: Bethune-Cookman, Morgan St, NC A&T, South Carolina St, Alabama St, Alcorn St, Southern and NC Central.
Tier V: Hampton, Howard, Norfolk St, Jackson St, Mississippi Valley St, Arkansas-Pine Bluff, Delaware St, Texas Southern, Alabama A&M, Grambling St, and Prairie View A&M.
Tier VI: Savannah St and Florida A&M.

Thursday Thoughts on the FCS Football landscape!

As our oldest son is now in residence at an FCS university (in Pocatello, Idaho, thank you very much!), plus we have a college degree with a rival school from the same conference (in Sacramento, CA), and family ties with a THIRD school in the same conference (in Missoula, Montana), we have a particular fondness for the Division 1-AA "championship subdivision " level of sports, football in particular, and of course that affection radiates from the northwestern sector of the United States, Big Sky country, home of multiple national champions Montana and Eastern Washington, former home of Boise State University (which has since moved on to conquer larger kettles of fish), and the University of Idaho (well, you can't win them all...).

So, without delving into conference and overall records as we did with the FBS last week - simply because we frankly don't know enough about many of the programs except what we read in the box scores - we're game for doing a little more forecasting this week in the twelve FCS conferences: eight who compete for a national championship in a 24-team playoff (hence the name "FCS"); two conferences of erudite Eastern schools who simply have BETTER things to do on a Saturday afternoon in December than watching sweaty men hurl spheroids down a chalk-lined parkway field; and two conferences of historically black colleges (not MY name - they refer to THEMSELVES as "HBCs"!) who choose to playoff against each other instead.

So, in only a vague sense of order of ranking, strongest down...here we go!

MISSOURI VALLEY CONFERENCE: 1. North Dakota St . 2. Illinois St. 3. Northern Iowa, South Dakota St, and Youngstown St. 6. Indiana St. 7. Southern Illinois and Western Illinois. 9. Missouri St. 10. South Dakota. 

BIG SKY CONFERENCE: 1. Eastern Washington. 2. Montana St. 3. Montana. 4. Idaho St. 5. Cal Poly SLO and Northern Arizona. 7. Sacramento St. 8. Southern Utah and Weber St. 10-13. Portland St, North Dakota, UC Davis, and Northern Colorado.

COLONIAL ATHLETIC ASSOCIATION: 1. New Hampshire / Villanova. 3. James Madison. 4. Richmond. 5. William and Mary. 6. Stony Brook. 7. Albany. 8. Maine. 9. Delaware. 10. Towson. 11. Elon. 12. Rhode Island. 

SOUTHLAND CONFERENCE: 1. Sam Houston St. 2. Stephen F Austin. 3. SE Louisiana. 4. Central Arkansas. 5-8. McNeese St, Northwestern St, Abilene Christian, and Lamar. 9. Incarnate Word. 10. Nicholls St. 11. Houston Baptist.

BIG SOUTH CONFERENCE: 1. Coastal Carolina. 2. Liberty. 3. Charleston Southern. 4. Presbyterian. 5. Monmouth. 6. Gardner-Webb. 7. Kennesaw St (in its first year playing football!).

OHIO VALLEY CONFERENCE: 1. Jacksonville St, 2. Eastern Illinois and Eastern Kentucky. 4. UT-Martin. 5. SE Missouri St. 6. Tennessee St and Tennessee Tech. 8. Murray St. 9. Austin Peay.

SOUTHERN CONFERENCE: 1. Chattanooga. 2. Wofford. 3. Samford. 4. Western Carolina 5. The Citadel. 6. Furman. 7. Mercer. 8. VMI. 9. East Tennessee St. (in its first year playing football!)

NORTHEASTERN CONFERENCE: 1. St. Francis-PA / Bryant (winner gets the playoff bid). 3-5. Wagner, Sacred Heart, and Duquesne. 6. Central Connecticut. 7. Robert Morris. 

PIONEER FOOTBALL LEAGUE: 1. Jacksonville. 2. San Diego. 3. Dayton. 4. Drake. 5-8. Marist, Campbell, Morehead St and Stetson. 9. Valparaiso. 10. Butler. 11. Davidson.

The 24 underlined teams are projected to receive bids to the FCS national championship tournament, which has eight teams passing through to the second round with byes. Those eight top-seeded teams are anyone's guess, but here's ours: North Dakota St, Illinois St,  Northern Iowa, Eastern Washington, Montana, Sam Houston St, Coastal Carolina, and the winner of the New Hampshire/Villanova clash. The three bottom conferences will get their champions in only, and here's hoping that for the first time in its three year history, the Pioneer League champ will be able to participate without infraction penalties preventing it!

There are also four other conferences in Division 1-AA: two comprised of elite prep universities in the northeast which choose not to spend December playing football during finals, and two comprised of "Historically Black Colleges" (HBCs), which have their own arrangement with NBC and ESPN for the Grambling/Southern game and the new "Celebration Bowl" title game matching the two league champs. Here are projections for these four leagues:

IVY LEAGUE: 1. Harvard (again!). 2. Dartmouth. 3. Yale. 4-6. Brown, Princeton, and Penn. 7. Cornell. 8. Columbia.

PATRIOT LEAGUE:  1. Fordham. 2. Lafayette. 3. Colgate. 4. Bucknell. 5. Holy Cross. 6. Lehigh. 7. Georgetown. 

SWAC EAST: 1 Alcorn St. 2. Alabama St. 3. Alabama A&M. 4. Mississippi Valley St. 5. Jackson St. 
SWAC WEST: 1. Southern. 2. Grambling St. 3. Prairie View A&M. 4-5. Texas Southern and Arkansas Pine Bluff. (Alcorn St over Southern for the title.)

MEAC: 1. North Carolina A&T / South Carolina St. 3. Morgan St. 4. NC Central. 5. Bethune-Cookman. 6-8. Hampton, Howard, and Norfolk St. 9. Florida A&M, home of the biggest band scandal since Stanford! 10. Delaware St. 11. Our favorite team in the world, good ol' Savannah St, who takes on Florida St and Oklahoma for the paycheck and the 88-0 routs. 

College and pro football seasons are just around the corner!

And the Following Football ACNC team will be all over it! We are currently making all of our preparations so that come September, we can provide you with the best insight into not only the 32 teams of the National Football League, but all 128 NCAA Bowl Division (1-A) teams, AND coverage of the 125 NCAA "1-AA" Football Championship Series" teams as well! 

Mind you, while our coverage of the Australian and Canadian leagues has been thorough, and our predictions cover every team for every game, there are just nine CFL teams and only eighteen AFL clubs to keep track of. Multiplying those 27 by ten or eleven will mean we may not predict every game for every team. We've promised to cover what we can handle, so YOU get the best coverage you can get! 

Right now our plan is wall-to-wall in the NFL and the Power Five conferences, wall-to-wall for all the teams in the FBS Group Of Five and the FCS Playoff conferences that our loyal readers tell us they want to see covered (right now, there's a profusion of Mountain West and Big Sky teams, logical as we're based here in Idaho), and as much coverage as we can on the rest. 

We are in the process of setting up our grids for schedules, spreads, trends, and standings, and despite our high record of success last year, we predict our predictions will be far superior to last year's results!

[Now, what does that mean for our other interests? Rugby? Futbol? Arena League? Well, we'll pass on our thoughts and stories as they come up, but they are NOT our focus. We're certainly not going to try to prognosticate in any of those areas when our knowledge of them is about as intimate as our knowledge of, say, Jessica Alba or Jennifer Lawrence.]

American Football season is almost upon us! Sit back and enjoy the games with your friends here at FOLLOWING FOOTBALL ACNC!

And - what about the four "Football Championship" schools who don't DO championships?

Regardless of the name, four of the twelve "FCS" schools do NOT participate in the championship playoffs - the Ivy League and Patriot League (both filled with top academic schools with - ahem - better things to do), and the MEAC and SWAC, the two "historically black colleges", or HBCs, which this season have decided to hold their own private championship, the "Celebration Bowl", which will (we suppose) unofficially crown the top HBC of the season.

So, let's look a little closer!

The Ivy League:
Of course, Harvard is the traditional power in the Ivy League, and comes into 2015 as the favorite again, with Yale and Dartmouth the only two teams with realistic aspirations to dethrone the two-time titlists. Brown, Princeton, and Penn will fill the center slots, while the Columbia/Cornell matchup (hysterical last year) once again will decide which team goes 1-9 and which goes 0-10. (We'll take Columbia to lose again.) 

The Patriot League:
Fordham has the same kind of stranglehold on the Patriot that Harvard does in the Ivy; their chasers include Bucknell and Lafayette, with Holy Cross and Colgate right behind, and Lehigh hanging on to their tails. Georgetown is the bottom of the ladder, but not as poor as Columbia or Cornell. 

So, our top four in the "Football Intramural Subdivision" will be Harvard, Fordham, Dartmouth and Yale for starters; and our "Bottom Three" would be Columbia, Cornell, and Georgetown. For what it's worth.

Meanwhile, in the Historically Black College conferences,

The MEAC:
...is a three-way fight between defending champ North Carolina A&T, South Carolina St, and Bethune-Cookman, and a one-loss, three-way tie is almost expected. Right behind them are North Carolina Central and Morgan St, vying for 4th and 5th. Then there's a gap to Hampton, Norfolk St, Howard, and Florida A&M, four schools with famous bands that almost make up for their teams! Pulling up the rear will be Delaware St and legendary Savannah St, seen most recently playing a running-clock game at Florida St because the rout was THAT BAD.

The SWAC:
In two divisions, there's a separation between the best team (Alcorn St) in the East, and the two most famous teams (Southern and Grambling St) in the West. Alcorn is only threatened by Alabama St, with three others trailing far behind: Alabama A&T, Jackson St, and Mississippi Valley St. In the West, Southern and Grambling are closely followed by Prairie View A&M, with a gap back to Texas-Southern and Arkansas-Pine Bluff.

So, our top four in the "HBC Subdivision" will be Alcorn St, North Carolina A&T, South Carolina St, and Bethune-Cookman to start the season; while our "Bottom Three" start as Savannah St, Delaware St, and Mississippi Valley St.