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NCAA Football Teams and FBS and FCS Conferences

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Because of the size of NCAA football, games air on a number of different channels. It’s best to go team by team, and we do have articles on the most popular ones. See below for details.

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NCAA football is vast with hundreds of schools participating overall and 278 teams in the Division I alone.

The Division I is further subdivided as follows:

SubdivisionConferencesTeams‡
Football Bowl Subdivision10133
Football Championship Subdivision14145
‡ FBS includes four independent teams and FCS includes one independent team.

How to Watch the NCAA FBS Conferences

There are too many important games each year for all the games to air on the top channels. But this list will give you a good overview of the channel families that air each conference:

  • American Athletic Conference (AAC): Most games air on ESPN channels. You will also see games on NBC, Fox, CBS Sports Network and channels associated with the opponent team’s conference. Less popular games usually stream on ESPN+.
  • Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC): The two conference channels, ACC Network and ACCNX, focus on broadcasting these teams’ games. But you will also see games on other ESPN channels, ABC, The CW, Fox Sports, and CBS Sports Network.
  • Big Ten Conference: The 4 channels of the Big Ten Network is where you will find most games. But there are also a lot of games on Fox and FS1. You will also find games on opponent channels as well as NBC, CBS Sports Network, ESPN, and others.
  • Big 12 Conference: Fox Sports and ESPN channels air a lot of these games but you will also see them on many other channels including ABC, NBC, The CW, CBS Sports Network, and even NFL Network.
  • Conference USA (C-USA): CBS Sports Network is where you can find most games but there are a number on ESPN channels and, of course, on opponent channels.
  • Mid-American Conference (MAC): Games air on CBS Sports Network and to a lesser extent on ESPN channels. Many games are streaming-only on ESPN+.
  • Mountain West Conference (MWC): Many games are on Mountain West Network with Fox Sports and CBS Sports Network filling in.
  • Pac-12 Conference: Previously, Pac-12 Network aired many games, but it is shutting down. Games for the two remaining teams generally show on large sports channels like Fox, ESPN, CBS, and others.
  • Southeastern Conference (SEC): Many games air on SEC Network and SECN+ but the biggest games are more likely on CBS or ESPN.
  • Sun Belt Conference: Most games appear on ESPN channels although a notable number of games can be seen on NFL Network. Many of the less popular games appear on ESPN+.

NCAA FBS Conference Teams

Here are the teams in all the conferences for 2024. Links are two pages we have created for specific teams.

American Athletic Conference

SMU left the AAC for the ACC. They were replaced by Army, which was previously an independent. Army is only playing in the conference in football.

  • Army Black Knights
  • Charlotte 49ers
  • East Carolina Pirates
  • Florida Atlantic Owls
  • Memphis Tigers
  • Navy Midshipmen
  • North Texas Mean Green
  • Rice Owls
  • South Florida Bulls
  • Temple Owls
  • Tulane Green Wave
  • Tulsa Golden Hurricane
  • UAB Blazers
  • UTSA Roadrunners

Atlantic Coast Conference

Starting in 2024, the ACC has 17 teams with the addition of Cal, Stanford, and SMU.

  • North Carolina Tar Heels
  • Pittsburgh Panthers
  • SMU Mustangs
  • Stanford Cardinal
  • Syracuse Orange
  • Virginia Cavaliers
  • Virginia Tech Hokies
  • Wake Forest Demon Deacons

Big Ten Conference

The Big Ten Conference expanded to 18 teams after UCLA, USC, Oregon and Washington joined from the Pac-12 Conference.

  • Illinois Fighting Illini
  • Indiana Hoosiers
  • Iowa Hawkeyes
  • Maryland Terrapins
  • Michigan Wolverines
  • Michigan State Spartans
  • Minnesota Golden Gophers
  • Nebraska Cornhuskers
  • Northwestern Wildcats

Big 12 Conference

One-third of the Pac-12 Conference (Arizona, Arizona State, Colorado and Utah) moved to the Big 12 this year to expand to a total of 16 teams.

  • Arizona Wildcats
  • Arizona State Sun Devils
  • BYU Cougars
  • Baylor Bears
  • Cincinnati Bearcats
  • Colorado Buffaloes
  • Houston Cougars
  • Iowa State Cyclones

Conference USA

Conference USA moves up to a nice round 10 teams with Kennesaw State moving up from the FCS.

  • FIU Panthers
  • Jacksonville State Gamecocks
  • Kennesaw State Owls
  • Liberty Flames
  • Louisiana Tech Bulldogs
  • Middle Tennessee Blue Raiders
  • New Mexico State Aggies
  • Sam Houston Bearkats
  • UTEP Miners
  • Western Kentucky Hilltoppers

Mid-American Conference

There have been no changes to the MAC since last season.

  • Akron Zips
  • Ball State Cardinals
  • Bowling Green Falcons
  • Buffalo Bulls
  • Central Michigan Chippewas
  • Eastern Michigan Eagles
  • Kent State Golden Flashes
  • Miami (OH) RedHawks
  • Northern Illinois Huskies
  • Ohio Bobcats
  • Toledo Rockets
  • Western Michigan Broncos

Mountain West Conference

The Mountain West Conference is the same as it was last year, but it is being combined to some extent with the remnants of the Pac-12 Conference.

  • UNLV Rebels
  • Boise State Broncos
  • San Jose State Spartans
  • Air Force Falcons
  • Wyoming Cowboys
  • Fresno State Bulldogs
  • Utah State Aggies
  • Hawaii Rainbow Warriors
  • Colorado State Rams
  • Nevada Wolf Pack
  • New Mexico Lobos
  • San Diego State Aztecs

Pac-12 Conference

The Pac-12 Conference has only two teams remaining and many are now calling it the Pac-2. This season, it will be combined with the Mountain West Conference as a kind of pseudo conference.

  • Oregon State Beavers
  • Washington State Cougars

Southeastern Conference

The SEC has expanded to 16 teams with the addition of Texas and Oklahoma.

Sun Belt Conference

The Sun Belt consists of 14 teams in two divisions.

  • Appalachian State Mountaineers
  • Arkansas State Red Wolves
  • Coastal Carolina Chanticleers
  • Georgia Southern Eagles
  • Georgia State Panthers
  • James Madison Dukes
  • Louisiana Ragin’ Cajuns
  • Louisiana-Monroe Warhawks
  • Marshall Thundering Herd
  • Old Dominion Monarchs
  • South Alabama Jaguars
  • Southern Miss Golden Eagles
  • Texas State Bobcats
  • Troy Trojans

Independents

Last year, there were 4 Independent schools in the FBS but now there are only 3 since Army joined the American Athletic Conference.

Football Championship Subdivision

Most of the games featuring the FCS teams are not shown on the major sports channels except when they are playing teams from the FBS. So look at the channels for opponents.

Note however that in many cases, the smaller schools will stream their own games for free. Check out the schools

The Division 1 FCS features 14 conferences.

Conference/LeagueTeams
Big Sky Conference12
Big South Conference4
Coastal Athletic Association Football Conference16
Ivy League8
Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference6
Missouri Valley Football Conference11
Northeast Conference7
Ohio Valley Conference7
Patriot League7
Pioneer Football League11
Southern Conference9
Southland Conference8
Southwestern Athletic Conference12
United Athletic Conference10
Frank Moraes
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