MIAA
KANSAS CITY, Mo. – Presidential leadership groups in five Division II football conferences, including the MIAA, have come together to sponsor a legislative proposal in the sport of football, which will be considered by football schools during a Division II membership vote at the 2024 NCAA Convention in Phoenix in January.
The proposed legislative change will permit an institution to play its first football contest with outside competition one week earlier than the current Division II start date. In essence, the change will give institutions an additional week to complete its regular season football schedule. This legislative exception will provide institutions with the flexibility to schedule and play the maximum 11 regular season football contests over a 12-week period, if desired. Benefits from this change include the ability to provide a bye/off week in the scheduling that year as a benefit to the student-athletes' health and safety; lessening the burden of finding available non-conference opponents and the added flexibility and financial benefit to include unique opportunities such as sponsored or destination-site football contests.
The Proposal is sponsored by the MIAA, the Central Intercollegiate Athletic Association (CIAA), the Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (SIAC), the Gulf South Conference (GSC), and the Lone Star Conference (LSC).
In Division II, there is a July 15 deadline for membership sponsored legislative proposals. The division only requires two conferences to officially sponsor a proposal to move it to the membership for a formal vote. In this case, based on overwhelming support from the Division II Football Coaches Connection representatives, there were five conferences where presidents agreed that they wanted to have their CEO leadership groups behind this potential legislative change.
Sports like Division II basketball, volleyball and softball already have built-in flexibility for institutions to consider options for scheduling both non-conference and conference regular season contests. This proposal would provide Division II football with that same type of flexibility and related benefits.
“This is a critically important legislative change for Division II football," explained MIAA Commissioner Mike Racy. “There is no flexibility built into the current Division II football regular season. You have 11 weeks to play 11 games. If you make the Division II football playoffs, you could possibly play 16 football games in 16 consecutive weeks. Not even the NFL thinks that is a good idea.
This is a commonsense proposal, with broad support at the grassroots level of the Division II membership, it is permissive legislation, it creates a better environment for the health and safety of Division II football student-athletes, and I believe this legislative change will encourage more non-conference scheduling opportunities for Division II football programs," Racy added.
In Division I football, this type of scheduling request for flexibility or unique weekend game promotional opportunity has been considered and approved through the division’s waiver process. In Division II however, such waiver requests have been denied by staff in Indianapolis citing “No Precedent” to permit this benefit for Division II football programs. Frustration with the NCAA waiver process has led some conferences to work on this legislative change.
According to HBCU Gameday, the NCAA declined the SIAC’s waiver request for a Week Zero game against the CIAA this past August. According to SIAC Commissioner Anthony Holloman, “The NCAA denied that waiver not one, but two times. So, we are working with other D2 conferences to establish legislation that will give us that opportunity. Some conferences are motivated by having 12 weeks to play 11 games, which will give them weeks for byes. From the SIAC’s perspective, we would like to have the opportunity to play Week Zero, and that would give us more television exposure.”