Wikipedia talk:WikiProject College football

2020-21 seasons

Moving this here.

Was there a discussion on what to do for the COVID-19 season in terms of coaching record tables? There about a million and a half different ways it has been expressed and I am unsure as to which should be done. I feel as though there are multiple feasible ways but I am unsure of a consensus which will tie into another point.

Option A, just stating no team
Year Team Overall Conference Standing Bowl/playoffs Framingham State Rams (Massachusetts State Collegiate Athletic Conference) (2020) 2020–21 Framingham State No team Framingham State: 0–0 0–0 Total: 0–0

Option B, no team + —COVID-19 like what was done with World War II teams that did not play
Year Team Overall Conference Standing Bowl/playoffs Framingham State Rams (Massachusetts State Collegiate Athletic Conference) (2020) 2020–21 Framingham State No team—COVID-19 Framingham State: 0–0 0–0 Total: 0–0

Option C, no team + note
Year Team Overall Conference Standing Bowl/playoffs Framingham State Rams (Massachusetts State Collegiate Athletic Conference) (2020) 2020–21 Framingham State No team Framingham State: 0–0 0–0 Total: 0–0

This goes along with the next point on if a season was played, should there be a note in the record table explaining that the games were played in the spring or just leave it without.

Third point, should 2020 be grayed out on the coaches navboxes like I did for:

{{Albany State Golden Rams football coach navbox}} {{Adams State Grizzlies football coach navbox}}

If we do that, that would also go in hand with what was done for World War II, but again, just a few questions for you/seeing if there was a consensus already. Thanks! Thetreesarespeakingtome (talk) 00:25, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

I, personally, believe option B is the best along with greying out the year in the navbox, although that will cause a small issue with {{Framingham State Rams football coach navbox}}'s Aynsley Rosenbaum and {{Azusa Pacific Cougars football coach navbox}}'s Rudy Carlton. Thetreesarespeakingtome (talk) 00:27, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

Thetreesarespeakingtome, thanks for bringing this up. I don't believe there ever was a discussion about this. It's probably worth transferring this discussion to WT:CFB to get more input. Option B seems best to me as well for consistency with how we've treated the World Wars. As for Rosenbaum and Carlton, since they never logged a single decision as head coach on their ledger, I think they fall into the category of a Bo Rein at LSU. Jweiss11 (talk) 01:49, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

Thetreesarespeakingtome (talk) 02:31, 24 May 2024 (UTC)

@Thetreesarespeakingtome: Instead of linking to COVID-19, which is the article about the virus, linking to COVID-19 pandemic or COVID-19 pandemic in the United States or Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on sports seems more appropriate. Or maybe there should be a new article for Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on sports in the United States? Jweiss11 (talk) 01:38, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on gridiron football, perhaps? Thetreesarespeakingtome (talk) 01:41, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

Yeah, that one looks like the best option. Jweiss11 (talk) 01:45, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

Conference awards in infoboxes

There is a proposal at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject National Football League#Proposal: Remove (some) conference awards from infoboxes that editors may be interested in.-UCO2009bluejay (talk) 14:00, 27 May 2024 (UTC)

Current starting QB navbox

Template:Southeastern Conference starting quarterbacks navbox, what are the thoughts about this?-UCO2009bluejay (talk) 03:01, 29 May 2024 (UTC)

Burn it with fire. Changes too often to provide any lasting value. Case in point, 6 of the 14 entries are currently incorrect, as those six players are currently either in NFL camps, or have transferred to other colleges. Ejgreen77 (talk) 03:44, 29 May 2024 (UTC)

Yeah, delete this per Ejgreen77's reasoning. Jweiss11 (talk) 04:09, 29 May 2024 (UTC)

J. J. McCarthy

See Wikipedia talk:WikiProject National Football League#J. J. McCarthy’s lead (again). Cbl62 (talk) 21:09, 2 June 2024 (UTC)

Service academy football

An A&E biography on Admiral William Halsey Jr. is on and it mentioned how he "played football on one of the worst team's in [Naval A]cademy history." All editorialism aside, I checked his page and it didn't have the Navy Midshipmen category and the WP:CFB tag on the talk page despite having information about his playing days in prose. It makes me wonder how many pages might also have these oversights?-UCO2009bluejay (talk) 01:12, 3 June 2024 (UTC)

Probably not that surprising for someone who played pre-Wikipedia and is not primarily known as a football player to be overlooked. —Bagumba (talk) 01:49, 3 June 2024 (UTC)

The service academy football teams have included many important military figures. For example, the 1912 Army Cadets football team included Dwight Eisenhower, Omar Bradley, Vernon Prichard, Louis A. Merrilat, Geoffrey Keyes, William M. Hoge, and Leland Devore -- not to mention Tennessee coaching legend Robert Neyland. For anyone looking for a worthwhile project, improving the service academy season articles (as well as adding CFB tags to player bios) is worth considering. Cbl62 (talk) 01:58, 3 June 2024 (UTC)

I'm not going to lie, I am not very strong at article improvement when it comes to promoting articles to GA, let alone FA. I can write well off Wikipedia, but I am completely unsure what really makes the threshold (and yes I've read the pages about that). But, I admire how the NFL project is working on making lists FLs. I wonder if a good start would be to raise Army, Navy, Air Force, and even the D-III Coast Guard program articles, head coaches, seasons, and bowl lists, to that standard?-UCO2009bluejay (talk) 02:14, 3 June 2024 (UTC)

July 1 realignment moves

I have noticed that some editors have started to move certain pages to their new conference affiliation ex, UCLA Bruins football, DeShaun Foster. When should these pages actually be updated? If it is in-fact on July 1, when should it be 12:00 am EDT, 6/30 11 CDT, 6/30 9 PDT, or 12 EDT, 12 CDT etc? (Eastern-time or institution time specific)-UCO2009bluejay (talk) 16:03, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

More examples Template:Southeastern Conference football navbox updated for 2024, Template:Southeastern Conference football rivalry navbox not fully updated for 2024.-UCO2009bluejay (talk) 16:09, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

I think it's probably okay to start making the changes now for the realignments that will occur on July 1. Jweiss11 (talk) 02:45, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

I concur. glman (talk) 14:11, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

@Bagumba: what do you think?-UCO2009bluejay (talk) 12:49, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

No opinion, but Foster's ibx has had Big Ten since Feb. —Bagumba (talk) 14:31, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

"19xx college football season" articles

Regarding the above series of articles, I've started adding a section for annual statistical leaders. E.g., 1950 leaders, 1951 leaders, 1952 leaders, 1953 leaders, 1954 leaders, 1955 leaders, 1956 leaders.

Any suggestions on formatting? Is the top 10 a reasonable cutoff? Should we include other categories such as punting? Team passing offense? Team passing defense? Team rushing offense? Team rushing defense? I also welcome help building this out for other seasons (the data can be found in both annual NCAA guides and in post-season newspaper reports). Cbl62 (talk) 21:46, 6 June 2024 (UTC)

Someone should make an article for the 1950 receiving leader (Gordon Cooper (American football)) ~WikiOriginal-9~ (talk) 01:18, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

I'll look into it :) BeanieFan11 (talk) 02:10, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

@WikiOriginal-9: Done: Gordon Cooper (American football). BeanieFan11 (talk) 21:45, 9 June 2024 (UTC)

• I've now also added the small-college stat leaders at 1956 college football season#Statistical leaders. Cbl62 (talk) 22:44, 7 June 2024 (UTC)
• 1957 college football season#Statistical leaders done too. Cbl62 (talk) 17:15, 9 June 2024 (UTC)

• Cbl62, we need to figure out what's happening with the the NAIA seasons here and fix broken architecture at Template:Infobox college football season and Template:NCAA football season navbox and in the category tree. Did we reach a consensus on when the University/College division split happened for football? Jweiss11 (talk) 17:39, 9 June 2024 (UTC)

• There was some disagreement as to the exact year, but it's somewhere between 1962 and 1964. I won't modify those years until there's consensus. Cbl62 (talk) 03:00, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

• So for now 1962 will be the first season with a divisional split? Jweiss11 (talk) 22:07, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

• I will defer to User:Dmoore5556 on which year to start the University/College Division split. Cbl62 (talk) 04:26, 12 June 2024 (UTC)

• I believe we should have unified (merged) articles up to and including 1961, and independent articles for 1963 and later. 1962 is less clear (lots of discussion elsewhere on this page) but at this point I'd say leave 1962 as-is (un-merged), primarily due to the Walter Byers quote, subject to a later change should something else come to light. Dmoore5556 (talk) 01:13, 13 June 2024 (UTC)

• 1958 and 1959 college football season#Statistical leaders done too. Cbl62 (talk) 04:24, 12 June 2024 (UTC)
• 1960 and 1961 now done as well. Cbl62 (talk) 03:52, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

• Cbl, thanks for all your work on this stuff. Some outstanding issues: 1) 1957 NAIA football season is still a stand-alone article. 2) How should we reflect the early NAIA seasons at Template:NAIA football navbox? 3) At 1960 college football season, for example, many standings templates, like Template:1960 Pennsylvania State College Conference football standings, are listed twice, under both "Minor conferences" and "NAIA conferences". 4) The category tree for both articles and standings templates needs to be updated according to these changes in the season naming scheme, see Category:1960 college football season, Category:1960 American football standings templates, etc. Jweiss11 (talk) 17:44, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

• I'm open to suggestions on whether we should have a separate section for NAIA standings. The problem is that a substantial number (maybe a majority?) were members of both NAIA and NCAA during some of these years. Cbl62 (talk) 21:30, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

• I moved 1957 NAIA football season. Cbl62 (talk) 21:42, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

• @Cbl62: Did you mean to redirect that to 1957 college football season, rather than to 1961 college football season? BeanieFan11 (talk) 01:14, 27 June 2024 (UTC)

• Thanks. Fixed it. Cbl62 (talk) 02:05, 27 June 2024 (UTC)

1956 college football season

Cbl62, I see you moved 1956 NCAA University Division football season to 1956 college football season per the above discussion. I have no object with eliminating College and University Divisions for this season, but 1956 NCAA College Division football season need to be merged in there. And what do we do with 1956 NAIA football season? Also, Template:NCAA football season navbox need to be updated accordingly. 02:44, 7 June 2024 (UTC) Jweiss11 (talk) 02:44, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

Per the discussion, I think both should be merged. Do you disagree? Cbl62 (talk) 02:58, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

No, I'm not against merging the NAIA article. But when do we start the stand-alone NAIA season articles? Whenever the University/College Division split in the NCAA happened? Also, merging the 1956 NAIA article with the 1956 NCAA College Division article will induce a CFB link call crisis. We need to create more 1956 team articles to avert this. Same for 1957, etc. Jweiss11 (talk) 04:57, 7 June 2024 (UTC)

Per the discussion I merged all three (University Division, College Division, and NAIA) into 1956 college football season.Cbl62 (talk) 04:28, 10 June 2024 (UTC)

Team categories holding only 1 article on a season

I am closing Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 May 13#Category:Pocatello Army Air Base Bombardiers football seasons with consensus to merge a single-season category.

Looking around the hierarchy, I see that e.g. Category:Air Transport Command Rockets football holds only one article 1945 Air Transport Command Rockets football team via a "seasons" sub-cat. The team category is also parented by Category:United States Army Air Forces sports teams, Category:College football teams in Tennessee and Category:Defunct American football teams in Tennessee.

There are similar category pairs within Category:Defunct college football teams each holding a single season article. Do these really have navigational value?

Note that each article will always remain within the college football category hierarchy via the season e.g. Category:1945 college football season. – Fayenatic London 08:44, 14 June 2024 (UTC)

I would say, yes, there is navigational value to have Category:Air Transport Command Rockets football seasons listed under Category:College football seasons by team. Jweiss11 (talk) 17:09, 14 June 2024 (UTC)

2024–25 bowl schedule released

FYI at https://bowlseason.com/sports/bowl/schedule/

Of note:

• Compared to recent playings, a couple games have been moved from January to December (Reliaquest Bowl, Citrus Bowl) while other games have been moved from December to January (First Responder Bowl, Duke's Mayo Bowl, Bahamas Bowl)
• Quick Lane Bowl lost Ford as its sponsor and is listed as "Detroit Bowl" while they seek a new title sponsor.

Feels WP:TOOSOON to create the season's bowl games article; passing along for reference. Dmoore5556 (talk) 01:24, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

I went ahead and created {{2024 bowl game navbox}} just to be ready; if there are any "(January)" or "(December)" instances missing that anyone finds please go ahead and add them. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 15:53, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

I'll take a look, thanks. I added disambiguation to a couple articles yesterday: 2024 Citrus Bowl (January) and 2024 ReliaQuest Bowl (January), as we will later have (December) variants. Dmoore5556 (talk) 19:12, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

On another note, how do we want to handle the first-round CFP games? I assume they won't each get their own article but should we have a summary article just for them (i.e. 2024–25 College Football Playoff first round, or something like that), or just let the overall 2024–25 College Football Playoff article summarize them? PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 15:58, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

2024–25 College Football Playoff only, please. Dmoore5556 (talk) 19:12, 18 June 2024 (UTC)

Yeah, I think we should probably limit the first-round games to detail at 2024–25 College Football Playoff and the respective team season articles. Stand-alone articles should probably only be created if a particular game rises to high, lasting notability like the rare cases of such regular season games found at Template:Historic college football games. Jweiss11 (talk) 17:23, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Fairmont State Fighting Falcons

There's a deletion discussion on the Fairmont State Fighting Falcons (an NCAA Division II program) that may be of interest. BeanieFan11 (talk) 19:36, 19 June 2024 (UTC)

Archive plan for Pac-12 conference pages and navboxes

I noticed @KingSkyLord today made a number of edits adding/removing navboxes from the departing Pac-12 members' sports articles.

Templates such as Template:Pac-12_Conference_football_rivalry_navbox have also been edited to remove the departing members.

First, I think these changes are premature. The Huskies, at least, don't join the Big Ten until August 2nd.

Second, I would perhaps like to see some kind of "Historic" information about the Pac-12 preserved in these articles and navboxes. Does this kind of information exist for any of the other disbanded conferences? What should be kept as-is for the Pac-12 and archived or marked as "historic"? What should be updated, in the short term, to only include WSU and OSU?

Some reference points:

• Southwest Conference
• Big East Conference
• Big East Conference (1979–2013)
• Template:Big_East_Conference_football_navbox

Seeking opinions on what should be done for the article on the historic Pac-12 Conference, the upcoming "Pac-2 Conference", their nav boxes, the team pages, etc.

PK-WIKI (talk) 16:51, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

We typically haven't kept former team information in navboxes, see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject College football/Archive 17#Defunct conferences as precedent. And per my question above, some editors have contended that it isn't too early to move to new conferences.-UCO2009bluejay (talk) 16:00, 25 June 2024 (UTC)

UCO2009bluejay, thanks for finding that relevant discussion from 2015. Template:Pac-12 Conference football navbox is still listing all 12 teams from its 2023 configuration, but the template is no longer transcluded on the articles for 10 members that left, e.g. Arizona Wildcats football. Jweiss11 (talk) 01:59, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

CfD: Category:Northwest Community College Conference football standings templates

I have nominated Category:Northwest Community College Conference football standings templates for renaming. Please see the discussion here. Thanks, Jweiss11 (talk) 05:52, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

CfD: Category:Kenyon Lords and Ladies

I have nominated Category:Kenyon Lords and Ladies and its subcats for renaming. Please see the discussion here. Thanks, Jweiss11 (talk) 17:17, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

Nomination for deletion of Template:Southeastern Conference starting quarterbacks navbox

Template:Southeastern Conference starting quarterbacks navbox has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the entry on the Templates for discussion page. UCO2009bluejay (talk) 23:06, 25 June 2024 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2024 June 26#Template:CBB yearly record subhead

There is a discussion at Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2024 June 26#Template:CBB yearly record subhead editors may be interested in participating in. It has the same functions of Template:CFB Yearly Record Subhead. -UCO2009bluejay (talk) 18:57, 27 June 2024 (UTC)

AfD: late 1800s team season articles

We have three AfDs open for late 1800s team season articles:

• Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/1884 DePauw football team
• Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/1884 Wabash football team
• Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/1895 Pacific Tigers football team

Jweiss11 (talk) 16:56, 29 June 2024 (UTC)

Draft:2001 Northwestern Eagles football team

I created this draft some time ago but couldn't find the needed SIGCOV to move it to main space. Surprising for a team with a perfect season. It is now set to be deleted. If anyone wants to adopt and work on the article, feel free to do so. Cbl62 (talk) 17:10, 30 June 2024 (UTC)

AfD: Boston College–Syracuse football rivalry

Boston College–Syracuse football rivalry has been nominated for deletion. Please see the discussion here. Thanks, Jweiss11 (talk) 21:02, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

Bud Wilkinson question

I read a couple of articles that said that Bud Wilkinson was a golf coach and the hockey coach at Syracuse? I couldn't find anything that had any statistics or years. If anybody has access to any resources, can they see if he was a head coach of either of these teams? Shouldn't this information be in the infobox as well?-UCO2009bluejay (talk) 04:29, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

There's no varsity golf or men's ice hockey team at Syracuse anymore, so I'm not surprised that info is hard to come by. Which articles indicated that coached golf and hockey at Syracuse? Jweiss11 (talk) 05:36, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

Oklahoma HOF, [1] (an Oklahoman newspaper article after his death), another Oklahoman, article Nixon Library, John P. Ward biography from Syracuse, that says Bud Wilkinson's gold (sic) teams from 1939-42.-UCO2009bluejay (talk) 07:20, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

AfD: List of NCAA Division III independents football records

List of NCAA Division III independents football records has been nominated for deletion. Please see the discussion here. Jweiss11 (talk) 17:04, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

TfD: Template:1966 Central Conference football standings

Template:1966 Central Conference football standings and two similar junior college standings templates have been nominated for deletion. Please see the discussion here. Thanks, Jweiss11 (talk) 18:57, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

Preseason info in 2024 articles

I am looking at a few 2024 articles, and see a ton of information in the preason regarding watch lists and preseason polls. Do we really need the entire SEC preseason poll in a team article wouldn't it be better as prose?-UCO2009bluejay (talk) 19:43, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

The entire preseason poll is be suited to appear only on the conference season article, 2024 Southeastern Conference football season. Jweiss11 (talk) 21:17, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

I agree but I wonder who keeps adding this stuff? It is only a matter of time before I will post here about the Nebraska article having external links in the schedule table take that to the bank.-UCO2009bluejay (talk) 21:28, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

There are a lot of fly-by and IP editors that tend do a lot of work on current season articles and often just do a copy-paste of whatever is there (including any bad habits) from the season before. That's why it's important that when we reach an editorial decision here about season articles, we apply it comprehensively to all the relevant articles. Jweiss11 (talk) 21:32, 3 July 2024 (UTC)

1961 college football season

Trying to help with the parserfunction (is that the right term, User:Jweiss11?) problem at 1961 college football season, I've recently started conference season articles as follows: (1) 1961 Central Intercollegiate Conference football season, (2) 1961 Michigan Intercollegiate Athletic Association football season, (3) 1961 Mid-Ohio League football season, (4) 1961 Northwest Conference football season, (5) 1961 Ohio Athletic Conference football team, (6) 1961 Pennsylvania State College Conference football season, (7) 1961 Presidents' Athletic Conference football season, (8) 1961 Rocky Mountain Conference football season, (9) 1961 Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference football season, and (10) 1961 Wisconsin State College Conference football season. Anyone want to help with sourcing, etc., on these articles? Or with creating additional conference season articles such as 1961 Carolinas Conference football season, 1961 College Conference of Illinois football season, 1961 Indiana Collegiate Conference football season, 1961 Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference football season? Cbl62 (talk) 23:30, 7 July 2024 (UTC)

I call it the "cfb link call crisis". I would love to help with sourcing here, but Wikipedia Library access to Newspapers.com has been down for a couple days. Jweiss11 (talk) 02:21, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

"The parsefuction" isn't bad. Amos Alonzo Stagg died for our sins? :) Jweiss11 (talk) 02:22, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

Conference season articles

Per the section above, we have an issue with these conference season articles that I've brought up before. We have a style fork. There are two types of conferences season articles. Type I is an older form that is largely used for NCAA Division I conferences for which individual articles for each team season also exist, e.g. 2023 Big Ten Conference football season. But there are also some instances of this form in use for lower division conferences, e.g. 2012 Kansas Collegiate Athletic Conference football season, 2012 Heart of America Athletic Conference football season. In the Type I form, the season is tackled week by week. In Type II, a form initiated by Cbl62, the season is tackled team by team, e.g. 1946 Southern California Conference football season. This form is largely used in cases where the individual team seasons likely do not warrant a stand-alone article. However, we have another solution for those sort of seasons: articles that cover many seasons for a single program, bounded by a decade or some other sensible time period, e.g. Southern Oregon Normal football, 1927–1938, Maine Black Bears football, 1892–1899, Henry Kendall Orange and Black football, 1895–1899, etc. We need to resolve this style fork. Thoughts? Jweiss11 (talk) 02:10, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

What are you proposing? Also, can you link to the prior discussion? Cbl62 (talk) 02:20, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

Well, I think I better way to present most of the content at 1955 Michigan Intercollegiate Athletic Association football season, especially the schedule tables, (and address the cfb link call crisis for c. 1930 to 1961, would be to create articles like Kalamazoo Hornets football, 1950–1959, and have 1955 Kalamazoo Hornets football team redirect to that article. 1955 Michigan Intercollegiate Athletic Association football season could be reworked to take on the Type I form explained above. Jweiss11 (talk) 02:22, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

As for the prior discussion, I'm not sure where it occurred. Could be in the archives here or on one of our talk pages. I'll look. Jweiss11 (talk) 02:23, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

I mentioned this issue last year here: Wikipedia talk:WikiProject College football/Archive 26#Once again, seasons over the limit for expensive parser function calls. Jweiss11 (talk) 02:29, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

• There's no need for the proposed homogeneity. Decade articles (or in some cases longer durations) have worked well for 19th century and very early 20th century small-school independents. E.g., the examples you gave above. The conference season articles work great for more modern teams that lack the coverage for individual team seasons. Conference season articles provide multiple benefits, including (i) allowing us to detail the history of smaller programs by collecting sufficient WP:SIGCOV to satisfy the WP:GNG requirement, (ii) telling the coherent story of a full conference in one centralized location, (iii) following the contemporaneous sources which often provide coverage to lower level programs on a conference-wide basis, and (iv) helping with the cfb link crisis. Conclusion: These articles are a win-win-win, let's make more of them. Cbl62 (talk) 17:44, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

  I would think there's more reader interest in a team than a conference season, so composite pages like Kalamazoo Hornets football, 1950–1959 would make reading easier than having to hop from one conference season pages to another. However, if content is sparse and being developed, I agree we should just be happy that content is being created. If a volunteer feels like wiping out a particular conference season randomly here and there, that's fine. Once a decade is completed, content can then possibly be moved to a specific team decade page, if that makes sense. —Bagumba (talk) 18:21, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

  Cbl, much of the coverage for these smaller programs is made on a conference-wide basis, but much of it focuses only a particular game or team. Some of it will focus on a particular program from year to year. The team decade articles plus the Type I conference articles will give us all the benefits you enumerate above, while also resolving the style fork. That's the real win-win. You claim there is "no need for the proposed homogeneity", but you don't explain why. Why do we have consistent style and homogeneity between analogous articles at all? Well, because consistency between analogs helps the reader understand the subject and navigate through the scope of its coverage. Would love to get some input from other editors who have been involved with these sorts of season articles. Patriarca12, Thetreesarespeakingtome, BeanieFan11, WikiOriginal-9, Dogloverr16, Butters.From.SouthPark, TheCatalyst31, PCN02WPS, Pvmoutside, Patriotsontop, any thoughts here? Jweiss11 (talk) 18:39, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

  I, personally, think that the conference pages are the best option. BUT with that being said I do think the season groupings for individual teams are also adequate especially for a team that is/was an independent an extended number of time. I also believe that season groupings under a head coaching tenure could work too (ie Stony Brook Seawolves football under Sam Kornhauser/Chuck Priore and UMass Dartmouth Corsairs football under Mark Robichaud,) but it would get replaced once the season's conference page gets created. When you get into the very early seasons (before 1940) there were many independents and THEN it would be better for a year-by-year page grouping the decade together into one page. Thetreesarespeakingtome (talk) 20:05, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

  Jweiss and I disagree and that should be ok. Unless you are advocating that I be prohibited from creating conference season articles. Is that your proposal?

Over the last few years, I have spent many days of labor building out roughly 150 conference season articles. See User:Cbl62/Conference season articles. They are set up to easily navigate from year to year for each team so that team navigability is facilitated. I believe these articles are among my best contributions to Wikipedia.

I am not aware of anyone creating team decade articles for the post-World War II era. (By my count, there are zero such articles.)

A major benefit to the conference approach is that we don't leave the weaker schools behind. You might find someone interested in creating decade articles on or two schools from the Ohio Athletic Conference, but the odds of someone creating decade article for all 15 such team strikes me as quite low. The conference approach doesn't leave the weak teams behind.

If at a later date, we see momentum toward someone creating team decade articles, we can figure out how to integrate. Cbl62 (talk) 20:31, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

I agree with this explanation more than I agree with my own. I think conference articles are the best way to go forward especially to the point of not leaving behind lesser teams. Alongside each team eventually getting their own page (which I had done a while back) to navigate between seasons and general information would greatly improve this underdeveloped set of pages. Thetreesarespeakingtome (talk) 20:52, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

My hope here is that we can reach a consensus about the form of conference season articles and one that resolves the style fork. It's pretty much the same amount of work to create 1960s decade articles for each of the six MIAA members during the period as it is to create 10 MIAA Type II conference season articles for the decade. In both cases, it's 60 team seasons. The long-term vision is to have 10 MIAA Type I conference season articles for the 1960s, where things like full all-conference teams would reside. My aim is to figure this out now, so we reduce the amount of effort reworking articles in years to come. Your many days of labor building out those 150 conference season articles, particularly all the sourcing from Newspapers.com are much appreciated. Right now we may have 150 articles that have to be reworked. What I want to avoid is finding ourselves three years from now with 1,000 articles that need to be reworked. Jweiss11 (talk) 20:53, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

The odds of someone creating any given article are entirely dependent on what we as editors decide to do. If we want to create decades articles for each OAC (and every other sub-DI team), we'll do that. We also have programs like Washington University Bears football, Washington & Jefferson Presidents football, Chicago Maroons football who were effectively major programs in their early days, but are now NCAA Division III. We already have a long array of stand-alone articles for each of these programs covering their years of major competition. But most if not all of their post-WW2 history would probably be better served with articles bundled by decade, which would mesh nicely with the existing stand-alone articles. And again, we need to address the style fork. It's confusing to have two different types of the same thing (conference season articles) out there. Jweiss11 (talk) 21:04, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

I created both branches of what you refer to as a "style fork." It's really not a "fork" at all; it's two different formats for two very different purposes.

• For major conferences (e.g., 1964 Big Ten Conference football season), there is no need to repeat the schedule charts as each team already has its own article. In these cases, the conference article is intended as a high-level overview. Cbl62 (talk) 22:02, 9 July 2024 (UTC)
• For minor conferences (e.g., 1946 Michigan Intercollegiate Athletic Association football season), there are no separate season articles for each team and so the conference season articles serves a different purpose -- it basically presents the contents of what would be a season articles for each team (including schedule chart) along with additional conference-wide information (e.g., all-conference selections).

So there it is. Not a "fork" at all -- more lack a fork and a spoon (different utensils to fulfill different needs). Cbl62 (talk) 22:02, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

• I started 1961 Rocky Mountain Conference football season this afternoon. Help or suggestions for improving it welcome. Cbl62 (talk) 21:51, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

Of course it's a fork, and Type II of the fork is indeed your creation, as you initiated it decade after Type I was established. We already have a stable form with dedicated templates like Template:CFB Conference Schedule Start, created in 2010. You came up with a local solution that has global problems, now you are denying that such global problem even exist. Jweiss11 (talk) 22:19, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

You call it a "fork". I call it a "fork" and a "spoon". Different tools for different functions, as described above. And by the way, I was the one who created what you call "Type 1" as well (back in 2016 (here)) -- just modifying the tools a bit to achieve best functionality. Cbl62 (talk) 22:46, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

You didn't create Type I. 2009 Big Ten Conference football season was created in 2009. There may be older examples. You didn't create Template:CFB Conference Schedule Start, Template:CFB Conference Schedule Entry, and Template:CFB Conference Schedule End, which were created in 2010 to standardize the tables for Type I--well the only type at the time, because you hadn't yet invented the Type II fork. Jweiss11 (talk) 22:56, 9 July 2024 (UTC)

I may have mis-remembered, but that's beside the point. The key is that the "spoon" (Type 1) and the "fork" (Type 2) are both valid utensils that serve different purposes. Innovation is permitted (and should be encouraged). Cbl62 (talk) 00:06, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

You didn't just misremember. You're not in touch with the reality of this situation. Breaking standard forms is not innovation, and this is not the first time you've done that. You're still denying the forking you initiated here, and instead of examining that, you've gone ahead hastily to create two more Type II forks since this discussion started, increasing the work load will have to done in future years to resolve it. And even within the Type II fork itself, you make the same mistakes over and over again, like mis-titling the title field of the infobox, omitting proper category sort keys, omitting needed categories on the associated categories that you create, and leaving rafts of table entries un wiki-linked. Jweiss11 (talk) 00:21, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

You didn't just misremember. You're not in touch with reality Jw -- You are acting like an ****** (unpleasant fellow), and I respectfully ask that you adjust attitude . Cbl62 (talk)

Cbl, when it comes to broad project management, competence is required. Jweiss11 (talk) 00:39, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

Anyway, my two cents are that for Division I (FBS and FCS) should have Fork I formatting due to each team mostly already having their own singular articles while Division II and lower (including NAIA perchance) should have Fork II that Cbl62 (and I) have been working on. I think that grouping seasons by decade works best in the early (1880s to 1940s). Although, a hybrid could be done as well by combining both for lower division seasons. From my understanding the big discussion is whether they should be grouped by conference or by team by decade and I have to favor by conference. Thetreesarespeakingtome (talk) 00:54, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

Jeesh. So much for adusting the attitude. 00:45, 10 July 2024 (UTC)