That North Dakota State would be the No. 1 seed and Montana State No. 2 wasn’t in doubt with the 2025 FCS playoff bracket. But there was intrigue about what the field would be behind last year’s national finalists. Here are some winners and losers on Selection Sunday.
The 2025 FCS playoffs will kick off on Saturday with eight first-round games, but the winning and losing actually started on Sunday when the 24-team pairings were announced.
Who was in, who was out and where teams were placed in the bracket all factored into anybody’s scorecard.
Here are some reactions from Selection Sunday:
Winners
Southland Conference
After back-to-back years with just its champion earning a bid, the Southland Conference should be loving its three-bid haul. Stephen F. Austin (10-2) has ridden the wave of a 10-game winning streak into a first-round bye as the No. 7 seed, while Southeastern Louisiana (9-3) also has a first-round home game as the No. 16 seed. Plus, Lamar (8-4) survived the playoff bubble, gaining an at-large bid despite going 1-3 in November with two of the losses against sub-.500 teams (the Cardinals’ No. 32 Massey Rating is lowest of the at-large qualifiers).
North Dakota and the MVFC
The Missouri Valley, which has the all-time conference high of 155 wins and 14 national titles in the playoffs, is deserving of the most qualifiers, but the number could have stopped at five and not gone to a record-tying six qualifiers (first with CAA Football in 2018, now the MVFC in 2021, ’23 and this year). North Dakota certainly lost to tough teams this season, including in three of its final four regular-season games to drop to 7-5. But the Fighting Hawks’ quality wins didn’t necessarily match the quality losses. Five of their wins were against last-place teams and there was only one against a playoff qualifier (Youngstown State).
Ivy League
Not only did the Ivy League reverse an 80-year postseason ban to join the playoffs, but its two co-champs, automatic qualifier Yale and Harvard, powered into the field without any strong non-league wins and into winnable first-round road games. Harvard (9-1) will be at No. 12 seed Villanova and Yale (8-2) will go to No. 15 seed Youngstown State. They could benefit from intrigued fan bases that may travel to the historic playoff debuts.
Losers
Tennessee Tech
The Golden Eagles (11-1) gaining the No. 13 seed was stunning, given they were ranked seventh on Nov. 5 when the playoff selection committee unveiled the second of two public top-10 rankings. They went on to wrap two OVC-Big South wins (21-9 at Eastern Illinois and 20-17 at home against second-place UT Martin) around an FBS loss to Kentucky. The committee didn’t value the OVC-Big South as much as last year, when it gained three playoff qualifiers, but the drop to 13 is both inconsistent and unjust.
Monmouth and United Athletic Conference
Monmouth’s season-ending loss to UAlbany was terrible on its resume, but the Hawks went 9-3, including a lopsided win over Villanova, and probably felt secure about an at-large bid. The selection committee announced them as one of the first four teams left out of the field. Committee chair Mark Wharton also mentioned on the ESPNU selection show that the health of Hawks quarterback Derek Robertson was discussed during the process – an unknown that’s not part of the selection criteria.
Austin Peay going for the win and failing on a 2-point attempt in overtime at Tarleton State on Saturday proved costly when the Govs dropped to 7-5. That could have opened the door for another United Athletic Conference team – third-place Southern Utah – to secure a bid, but both teams joined Monmouth and Presbyterian as the first four out of the FCS playoff bracket.
A Little of Both
Montana
How the No. 3, 4 and 5 seeds would go was one of the bigger questions leading into the bracket – the three-seed avoids a potential semifinal against defending national champion NDSU inside the Fargodome. The Grizzlies were No. 3 in the playoff selection committee’s top 10 ranking on Nov. 5 and stayed there despite a three-point loss to Montana State on Saturday while No. 4 seed Tarleton State and No. 5 seed Lehigh didn’t lose during their final stretch. But while the Griz could have a rematch with rival Montana State in a semi, the path there is difficult, starting with a likely second-round matchup against South Dakota State, which has a No. 5 Massey Rating (just two behind the Griz) and, of course, is a two-time champion and at least a semifinalist in seven of the last eight postseasons. SoCon champ Mercer or South Dakota (a 2024 semifinalist) loom in the quarterfinal round.
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