Sacramento Kings
College Football Roster Size How Teams Are Built
- Will the NCAA move to limit football rosters to 100 players?
- In college football, the rich get richer, with many top high school players and transfers landing at perennial powers.
- Transfers helped Ohio State win the national title.
There has been some discussion about capping rosters for the Football Bowl Championship teams at 100 players, which has resulted in some pushback from those associated with the top programs who want the college football roster size to stay the same.
It is something to watch in the next couple of seasons. When Ohio State and Notre Dame met in the College Football Championship Game, the teams had rosters of 120. As a point of reference, NFL teams make it through the season with 53 players on the active roster and 16 others on the practice squad. Changing the NCAA football roster limit rules could be an uphill battle since the top teams come from conferences with the most power.
Players leaving via the transfer portal might make it difficult for modern-day teams to be considered among the top college football teams of all time.
Let’s look at how college football rosters are put together.
Plenty Of Ways To Compile A College Football Roster
Transfer Portal Taking Over
Three of the top nine teams in the transfer portal rankings by the 247sports.com database were among the 12 teams taking part in the College Football Playoffs.
Ohio State didn’t bring in as many transfers as some of the other title contenders, as it prioritized quality over quantity. Quarterback Will Howard, safety Caleb Downs, running back Quinshon Judkins, and offensive lineman Seth McLaughlin led the list of incoming transfers for the Buckeyes.
Could Ohio State have won the national title without those additions? It is possible.
LSU, Ole Miss, Texas Tech, Auburn, and Miami have the top classes of incoming transfers, but none of those teams reached the CFP playoffs during the 2024 season. Would a change in the NCAA football roster size impact which teams compete for the national title?
Teams Eyeing The Best High School Players
Both Ohio State and Notre Dame had players on the freshmen All-American teams. It was hard to think about the 2024 Ohio State Buckeyes without reflecting on the impact of receiver Jeremiah Smith. Offensive lineman Anthonie Knapp was among the freshmen who made an impact for Notre Dame, which continues to be considered one of the college football blue blood programs.
Teams typically look to bring in a group of high school recruits in the 20-25 range. Four years of adding 25 high school recruits brings the roster to 100, which doesn’t factor in the transfers. Things could be interesting in the battle over college football roster size.
Six of the top 11 teams in the 2024 high school recruiting rankings made it into the College Football Playoffs.
CFP teams Texas, Georgia, Ohio State, and Oregon are among the top recruiting classes heading into the 2025 season.
Walk-Ons Could Be Impacted With A Rule Change
College teams load up on talent by adding preferred college football walk-ons. That takes talented players away from other teams and makes the rich richer.
If there is a cap on the number of players on the roster of college football teams, the walk-ons would be the ones likely to be impacted the most, even if rules on NCAA scholarship limits remain the same.
Moving to 100-player rosters could benefit teams outside the ACC, Big Ten, Big 12, and SEC.
Looking Back At The Top Transfers
Eight of the top nine transfers who changed teams from 2023 to 2024 either left or joined SEC teams.
Safety Caleb Downs, who left Alabama for Ohio State, led the list of transfers, followed by Alabama offensive lineman Kadyn Proctor, Ole Miss defensive lineman Walter Nolen, and receiver Isaiah Bond.
Miami is among the teams with the longest home-winning streaks in college football history. For a while, it looked like Cam Ward would have Miami in contention for another national title.
Fresno State edge rusher Korey Foreman was the highest-rated transfer to land at a team outside the ACC, Big Ten, Big 12, SEC, or Notre Dame.
Transfers Earning Top Draft Grades
It was unusual for the top pick in the NFL Draft to change schools while playing college football, but that is not the case nowadays.
Quarterback Cam Ward, who has played for Incarnate Word, Washington State, and Miami, is the favorite to be the top pick in the 2025 NFL Draft. Among the 10 players with the shortest odds of being the first pick, five played for multiple programs.
That is a sign of the times. Jayden Daniels, who had a brilliant rookie season with the Washington Commanders, is another NFL rookie who did well despite transferring at least once in college.
Concerns Moving Forward
Thanks to the Name and Image Likeness rules, teams can buy top players, but rosters can also be ripped apart by players hitting the transfer portal.
At times, it feels like the Wild West, with top programs not shy about recruiting players on other teams’ rosters.
Some teams pulled out of bowl games because of the large number of players in the transfer portal.
An argument for the top programs is that a larger roster helps to insulate a team from outgoing transfers. Those programs aren’t in favor of NCAA football roster limits. However, the teams that get hit the hardest tend to be ones from the Group of Five conferences.
College football leaders are still trying to adapt to the sport’s changing landscape, including how rosters are assembled.
