With the departure of just one program, FCS football has a different vibe in 2026. The arrival of spring practices calls for a closer look at what to know about for the season ahead.
There’s no need to fret over that always controversial one hour of lost sleep – think of the time change more as a spring forward toward the 49th season of FCS football.
Two months have passed since Montana State slipped past Illinois State 35-34 in the first FCS championship game to require overtime. Winter workouts are turning into spring practices, and optimism, renewal and anticipation flow across college football.
As preparation continues, we answer five key questions about the 2026 season.
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North Dakota State is moving to the FBS level this year following the most successful run in FCS history (10 national titles in the last 15 seasons). It creates the possibility for more programs to be to realistic title contenders.
This year’s conference realignment involves 10 programs and eight conferences in the FCS. Sacramento State, like NDSU, is FBS-bound and Saint Francis is dropping down to Division III, but Chicago State will play an inaugural season. It makes for 127 FCS programs in 2026.
The head coaching carousel has brought change to 25 FCS programs, including four making straight FCS-to-FCS moves: Eddie Robinson Award recipient Kevin Cahill (Lehigh to Yale), Rick Santos (New Hampshire to Penn), Joel Taylor (West Georgia to Mercer) and Steve Englehart (Presbyterian to West Georgia).
Week 0 is now open to all FCS teams, beginning Aug. 27 as a standalone Thursday night for the subdivision and continuing for two more days. The FBS has just a small handful of games on Aug. 29.
Also, a handful of rules tweaks are in the NCAA proposal stage, including a player ejected for targeting for the first time not having to sit out the first half of the next game, and a lowering of pass interference from a 15-yard penalty to 10 yards.
Who Are the Top Teams?
An FCS program has won two or more consecutive national titles eight different times, and 2025 champion Montana State is the team to beat.
Half of the Bobcats’ starting lineup in the championship game is returning, including quarterback Justin Lamson, two-time 1,000-yard rusher Adam Jones, 1,000-yard receiver Taco Dowler), three offensive linemen (one is first-team All-American Titan Fleischman), and the defense’s top three tacklers (Cole Taylor, Caden Dowler and Bryce Grebe).
FCS Football 2020s WinsSouth Dakota State is the most recent back-to-back champion (2022 and ’23), and following NDSU’s departure appears to be the top team in the Missouri Valley Football Conference with QB Chase Mason and other veterans. Unless, that is, national runner-up Illinois State fills a lot of the void with another strong lineup that includes two-time first-team All-America linebacker Tye Niekamp and RB Victor Dawson and WR Dylan Lord off breakouts in the postseason.
Montana, a national semifinalist, boasts QB Keali’I Ah Yat and RB Eli Gillman, the Big Sky offensive player of the year, although Bobby Hauck, the conference’s all-time winningest coach, has departed the program.
The last five national championship games have involved only Big Sky and MVFC teams. Incredibly, the last title game qualifier from another conference to still be an FCS program stretches all the way back to Towson of CAA Football in 2013.
Are There Other Contenders?
The top teams don’t necessarily leave much elbow room in the playoffs as the last nine FCS champions have been either a No. 1 or 2 seed. But just as an unseeded Illinois State made a jump last season, different teams are primed for deeper runs in the postseason.
UC Davis and South Dakota – yes, the Big Sky and MVFC again – are the only two programs other than Montana State and Montana to reach the national quarterfinals in each of th last two seasons. UCD is stacked on offense and will be on defense if the NCAA grants brothers Rex and Porter Connors another season of eligibility.
Villanova is coming off a semifinal-round appearance and its fourth season of 10+ wins in the last five years. It’s departing a CAA that once was the beast of all FCS conferences for the Patriot League, but the CAA still has defending champion Rhode Island and its passing combo of Devin Farrell to Marquis Buchanan.
Tarleton State has only known winning records in its first six FCS seasons and has FBS aspirations, but the Texans first seek greater success in the playoffs. FBS drop-down QB Braedyn Locke headlines an outstanding group of transfers.
What Conference Races Stand Out?
A shared title occurs frequently in college football, but 11 of the 13 FCS conferences had an outright champion last season. Expect a lot of bunching in the 2026 races, particularly down south.
The Southern Conference had six straight different outright champions before Mercer was a repeat winner last season. The rest of the conference keeps beating up on each other – only Mercer and Western Carolina have fewer than six conference losses over the two seasons – and now Tennessee Tech comes aboard as a 10th program after winning the OVC-Big South title last year.
The Southland Conference was already at 10 teams, and, oh, is it tight. Lamar appears talented enough to win its first conference title since 1971, although Stephen F. Austin went unbeaten and Southeastern Louisiana only lost to the Lumberjacks last season. There’s also UTRGV coming off a 9-3 (5-3) inaugural season and 2024 champ UIW seeking to get back on track.
The United Athletic Conference features two of the four FCS teams to knock off FBS opponents last season – Tarleton State and Austin Peay – while Abilene Christian has defeated Tarleton in each of the last two conference seasons. They shared last year’s title.
In each of the last two playoffs, Lehigh faced a team that would join it in the Patriot League the next season. This year, it’s Villanova and William & Mary following Richmond out of the CAA and into the PL, meaning seven of the 10 programs will have appeared in the playoffs since 2022.
Who Are the Top Returning Players?
The increase of transfers across college football this decade has led to higher turnover of rosters, but the return of nine first-team selections on the 2025 Stats Perform FCS All-America Team and nearly 22% of the 111 overall selections are up from last year.
Conveniently, quarterback is the position of strength, led by Youngstown State’s Beau Brungard. As the Walter Payton Award turns 40 this year, the 2025 FCS offensive player of the year seeks to become the third two-time recipient. (Watch the 2025 FCS Awards Show)
Brungard made the All-America first team, but the 2026 returnees also include Montana’s Keali’I Ah Yat and Montana State’s Justin Lamson from the second team, and Austin Peay’s Chris Parson and Southern Illinois’ DJ Williams from the third team. Ah Yat surpassed 4,000 passing yards last season, while Brungard, Lamson, Parson and fellow returnees Devin Farrell (Rhode Island), Ty Pennington (Northern Arizona) and Jordan Cooke (Idaho State) were over 3,000 each.
Returning first-team All-Americans in addition to Brungard are WR Marquis Buchanan (Rhode Island), OL Titan Fleischmann (Montana State), defensive end and Buck Buchanan Award runner-up Joshua Stoneking (Furman), LB Tye Niekamp (Illinois State), DBs Caden Dowler (Montana State) and Abu Kamara (Yale), kick returner Ja’briel Mace (Villanova) and punt returner Bugs Mortimer (Stephen F. Austin).
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Spring (Practice) Forward: Five Questions For the 2026 FCS Football Season Opta Analyst.
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