Short YouTube clip by Trenton Luera (uploaded Feb 25, 2024) in which he ranks U.S. college football divisions and explains the reasoning. He places D1 (FBS, with Power 5 then Group of 5 and FCS) at the top, followed by D2, then NAIA (NAA in transcript), then D3, and finally junior college — citing scholarship numbers, NIL, and school draw as primary factors.
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Here's my ranking of college football divisions. It's not as simple as just D1, D2, D3, NAA. In reality it's actually D1, D2, NAA, D3 and then junior college. Now D1 is at the top. That's pretty obvious with power 5 being at the top group of 5. Then FCS below that. Now below that you got D2. Again, makes sense. So far, D1 FPS has the most scholarships, so it makes sense that they would have the better players. On top of that with nil now players are even more drawn to go FBS And FCS being second, they have less scholarships than D1 FBS, so it makes that they're better than D2 as well because D2 has less scholarships. So kind of in between again, a good group of talent, for example South Dakota State probably would be in the top 25 at the FPS level. Next is D2. Again, a lot of good program, but they have less scholarships than FBS and fcs. Plus they're not as great schools. So you know they're not really going to be as drawn to go to a D2 program over an FCS or an FBS program. Now below D2 is where it gets a little tricky. A lot of people would think that the clear next step is D.