To-do list for Wikipedia:WikiProject College football: edit · history · watch · refresh · Updated 2022-12-11
~WikiOriginal-9~ (talk) 17:25, 24 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I've a nominated two categories related to junior college sports for renaming. Please see the discussions below.
Thanks, Jweiss11 (talk) 01:37, 12 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks, Jweiss11 (talk) 03:58, 20 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
On Template:Infobox college sports team season, there are fields called mvp_year and captain_year for the year of the team's captain(s) and mvp(s). The template documentation indicates that these should be used for the ordinal year the given player held the title of team mvp or team captain. In practice, there's been some confusion about these fields, as sometimes they have been populated with the class (junior, senior, etc.) of the player. These fields are rarely used. Some of the more recent Michigan football seasons, like 2023 Michigan Wolverines football team, are a few instances where they are used. The data for these fields is pretty obscure and rather unnecessary, in my opinion. Any objections if we delete these fields from the template? Thanks, Jweiss11 (talk) 03:57, 20 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
mvp_year
captain_year
Hi there, as I saw some suggestions in the AfD discussion here, due to the scope of the request, and the fact some people seemingly are opposed to my proposal, here's the RfC.
What action, if any, should we do with the following class of articles that are about seasons of American football college teams? Szmenderowiecki (talk) 18:39, 21 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
While clicking random articles, I stumbled upon an article about one of the NYU Violets seasons that had a notability tag and was just one sentence long. So I started to investigate the seasons articles. A lot of them have this template:
The [year] [college_team_name] football team was an American football team that represented [college_name] as an independent during the [year] college football season. In their [cardinal_number] year under head coach [coach_name], the team compiled a [win-loss-tie] record. Optionally: a random and rather trivial fact about the team during that season For some articles: [college_team_name] was ranked at No. [cardinal_number_2] (out of [team_number] college football teams) in the final rankings under the Litkenhous Difference by Score system for [year].
Table of scores, which contains the only sources or almost all of the article sources; the vast majority, if not all, are news coverage immediately after the event and are thus primary.
I believe that the articles violate several policies and guidelines, including:
Wikipedia articles should be based mainly on reliable secondary sources, i.e., a document or recording that relates to or discusses information originally presented elsewhere.
During the AfD, I got pushback on the idea that nominating five sets of articles that were all of terrible quality was a good idea (basically for WP:TRAINWRECK reasons, which should not apply here because I am agnostic as to the resolution of the problem; deletion, consolidation, refactoring, draftification, whatever). One editor suggested that I nominate each of them separately, which would be feasible for 5 or 10 articles, but not with potentially thousands. Chances are that any random article you click in Category:College football seasons by team, after you navigate to your team of interest, is a stub. There are some exceptions; from what I saw there were OK articles about Pittsburg Steelers and good articles about five or so early seasons of Navy Midshipmen, but the vast majority of others was just stubs, or stubs with tables stacked one upon another, which isn't much better. Another editor said that we have a long-standing consensus that topics like 1926 NYU pass GNG (it was only improved after I started the AfD) I was presented with examples of good articles about football seasons - 1884 Navy or 2009 Michigan, for example, but they are few and far between.
we have a long-standing consensus that topics like 1926 NYU pass GNG
For this argument, I'm being accused of obtuseness on my talk page. I asked the regulars to choose a couple of teams to say where the issues are. Apparently articles like these are said to be within the consensus of AMF for ~20 years as acceptable, but local consensus cannot override the core policy of having to primarily rely on secondary sources. I asked the AMF regulars themselves to evaluate any given region and tell me what they think about the seasons articles, and most of my concerns were dismissed because "they are an FBS team!" or "a perfect score in Division III is a-OK for establishing notability" - which IMHO sounds preposterous for me - at this rate we could just start writing about how seniors trash all other football players in Podunk High School, or "look, this article is 10KB and has 20 sources" - most of which are simply news reports just after the match to support adding the score in the table. Initially, my issue was indeed to delete them, but that's not my point anymore. Instead, I want editors to look into any way to improve the presentation of content.
Cbl62 has presented me two books about Rutgers to defend the assertion that we absolutely need seasons articles. These books are exactly what we need. Not that I saw them used much in the seasons articles. In fact, my argument is that assurances that "we'll eventually fix this issue, bear with us while we spend thousands of hours improving the content" ring hollow because we have tons of 5-, 7-, 10-year-old stubs that haven't been expanded yet, and new stubs are being created. The community is patently unable to maintain all of the articles at once without overstretching themselves; and because their consensus appears to be contrary to the policies and guidelines mentioned above, I ask others to weigh in. Szmenderowiecki (talk) 18:39, 21 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Note: ? means the season article has some qualities that give it a somewhat acceptable quality - statistics that could be formulated in prose, some info about the season etc. Years without any additional qualifiers suggest these articles are stubs - i.e. have at most a couple of sentences and do not really describe the season; it is exclusively, or mainly, concerned with noting results of football games, but not describing them or showing how this is in any way notable. It does not necessarily mean that the topic is not notable at all - after all, notability is about the topic's prominence and not about the state of the article - but that it has pretty serious quality issues and is unlikely to get expanded to an acceptable state in the medium perspective; in other words, something has to be done with the articles because this will not do.
Northern New England:
Massachusetts:
Connecticut and Rhode Island:
Downstate New York:
Upstate New York:
Pennsylvania (South-Eastern):
Pennsylvania (rest of state):
New Jersey:
Maryland, Delaware and DC:
West Virginia:
Virginia:
Other:
Articles reviewed are exclusively articles about seasons of collegiate American football teams. Individual games, articles about the competitions as a whole or rivalries were not reviewed. Due to the breadth of review, only 14 jurisdictions were taken into account: Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Maryland, Delaware, West Virginia, Virginia and the District of Columbia. All divisions were taken into account. Review was done manually based on the state of articles as of 15-16 Feb 2025
Articles that are without the question mark are those whose quality is so bad something must be done. Examples: 1882 Harvard Crimson football team, 1897 NYU Violets football team, 1908 Georgetown Blue and Gray football team, 1920 Virginia Orange and Blue football team, 1927 West Virginia Mountaineers football team, 1934 Washington College Shoremen football team, 1945 Camp Detrick Army Chemists football team, 1954 Villanova Wildcats football team, 1961 Lebanon Valley Flying Dutchmen football team, 1974 Rutgers Scarlet Knights football team, 1993 Marshall Thundering Herd football team, 2015 Central Connecticut Blue Devils football team, 2023 Delaware Fightin' Blue Hens football team
Years with the question marks are years where there may be some possibility to save the article (IMHO of course) because there is ample notability and the quality isn't terrible. For example, most 2024 articles have statistics tables that may constitute a valid basis for an article, because they don't just note a score, even if some of those table are unfilled for whatever reason. Other articles have sourced descriptions of games.
Szmenderowiecki (talk) 18:39, 21 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Consider starting with one decade of one program. Do an individual nomination of a season. If merged or deleted, rinse and repeat on a few more. If results are continuously to not keep, consider a few multi-page noms. If a full decade ends up not being kept, reconvene on what conclusions can be drawn for efficient follow-up.—Bagumba (talk) 19:57, 21 February 2025 (UTC)[reply]
are acceptable topics in terms of notability. So they merit having an article.
They reflect the individual viewpoint of a participant or observer.
Wikipedia articles should be based on reliable, published secondary sources, and to a lesser extent, on tertiary sources and primary sources.
"A national championship season at the top collegiate level is generally notable"
"For programs considered elite in a sport..."
Feedback on the AfD for 2024 Michigan vs. Ohio State football game would be greatly appreciated at the following link: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2024 Michigan vs. Ohio State football game. Thank you. PCN02WPS (talk | contribs) 17:30, 14 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
It might be time to either expand the general manager page or create a new specifically tailored towards college football with recent notable GM hires such as Michael Lombardi at UNC, Andrew Luck at Stanford, and Ron Rivera at Cal. ~ Dissident93 (talk) 01:15, 21 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Heisman compiled a list for the Atlanta Georgian and any help on expanding the articles is appreciated: 1) John Edgerton; 2) Billy Williams; 3) Henry D. Phillips; 4) Bob Blake; 5) Wright Blanche; 6) Buster Hunter; 7) Red Smith; 8) Owsley Manier; 9) M. S. Harvey; 10) Lob Brown; 11) Bradley Walker; 12) Jim Penton; 13) Lex Stone; 14) Honus Craig; 15) John Maxwell; 16) Auxford Burks; 17) Stein Stone; 18) Walker Leach; 19) Frank Jones; 20) J. R. Davis; 21) Aubrey Lanier; 22) Joe Pritchard; 23) Carl Sitton; 24) Eugene Caton; 25) Vin Campbell; 26) Jenks Gillem; 27) Ray Morrison; 28) John E. Davis; 29) Tom Brown; and 30) Bob McWhorter. Cake (talk) 23:07, 21 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Why do we have pick in the round in the tables? It isn't noteworthy is it?-UCO2009bluejay (talk) 00:41, 23 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
If you can update or improve it, please do so
For most of the last 10 years or so, this project has had a consensus favoring individual season articles for major college football teams. I continue to support that consensus. However, as we have continued to expand our coverage into lower tiers of football, I've been persuaded that decade articles (or other multiyear combinations as may be logical) are a better approach in many cases. I'm still not sure exactly where the line should be drawn, but I currently believe the multi-season approach should be considered in at least two areas: (1) early years of college football, and (2) lower-tier programs. These are both factors that are associated with less depth of coverage. Where both factors are present (olden times plus lower level), the decision to adopt a multi-season approach is easiest. Of course, there might be exceptions (e.g., national championship seasons or other extraordinary circumstances) where there is good reason to create/preserve an individual season article.
The biggest virtue of the multi-season approach IMO is that it allows us to continue building our coverage of college football history while reducing concerns/disagreements as to whether individual season articles comply with WP:GNG, WP:SIGCOV, and WP:NSEASONS. I also see some benefit in that it allows for an opening lead section summarizing the highlights and providing context for the program's performance over a somewhat longer time period.
The biggest drawbacks of the multi-season approach include (1) a possible impediment to article creation (it's a lot more time consuming to create a decade article than a single-season article), and (2) it might be a deterrent to building out further details (e.g., roster, game summaries, etc.) on an individual season. I also wonder whether a reader might find it more difficult to navigate to the specific season/information they are seeking. I also would not want to see the multi-season approach be treated as a waiver of the need to add SIGCOV -- a multi-season article should still IMO have SIGCOV. Whichever approach we follow, the days of creating articles sourced only to databases should be behind us.
Recently, User:Jweiss11 and I have been working together to build out our coverage of the early years of the Michigan Intercollegiate Athletic Association (the oldest college football conference, but a lower-level one) using the multi-season approach. As part of this effort, we have redirected pre-existing season articles to the new multi-season articles. Examples of the newly-created multi-season articles include:
Runs of seasons where a team has played very few games are also ripe for the multi-season approach. E.g,, NYU Violets football, 1873–1889 (17 games played in 17 years).
Comments and suggestions are welcome on (1) whether this approach is desirable at all, (2) ideas as to how to improve such multi-season articles, and (3) most significantly, where and when we should draw the line between a multi-season vs. single-season approach. Help editing the articles is also welcome. @Jweiss11: @Patriarca12: @PK-WIKI: @MisterCake: @Toll Booth Willie: @Carrite: @Thetreesarespeakingtome: Cbl62 (talk) 21:06, 25 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Are game recaps considered a primary or secondary source?
For Wikipedia's purposes, breaking news stories are also considered to be primary sources.
Darian Durant has been nominated for a good article reassessment. If you are interested in the discussion, please participate by adding your comments to the reassessment page. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, the good article status may be removed from the article. Z1720 (talk) 02:00, 30 March 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
In many bios, like Montez Sweat, their junior college career is referred to as "college football" in prose and the infobox. I find this misleading—they are different levels of play compared to four-year universities, and seem rarely lumped together in reliable sources. I'd propose removing this from infoboxes and leads, as one's juco play (like HS) is generally not what makes one notable. —Bagumba (talk) 10:49, 4 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I was recently tasked as part of my disclosed paid editor duties with Arizona State University to overhaul the alumni list. I found it to contain many, many omissions—somewhere on the order of 300 notable football players alone were missing (and that is the largest athletics-side piece left of the overhaul at User:Melted Brie/Alumni).
However, I'm running into an issue for which I cannot find any guidance in any college sports project. It is increasingly common now, thanks to the transfer portal and changed eligibility requirements, for college athletes to split their eligibility among two or more schools. In perusing publications from ASU's own athletic department, e.g. a list of Sun Devils competing in the NFL, players that had played at ASU but transferred to and finished their careers at other institutions (e.g. Jayden Daniels, Ricky Pearsall) were not listed, though players in the opposite situation (started at another school and transferred to ASU) were. I would expect people who played at ASU—even if they later finished their career elsewhere—to be listed, even if official sports information documents don't claim them as alumni. This is something I expect to see in more sports, given that the list expansion has turned up other notable transfers out of ASU like Hubert Kós and Joson Sanon.
Is there any guidance or point of view that can assist with this, or a standard of when players should and shouldn't be classified for list purposes? Sammi Brie (she/her · t · c) 03:28, 7 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Jim Moran has been nominated for a good article reassessment. If you are interested in the discussion, please participate by adding your comments to the reassessment page. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, the good article status may be removed from the article. Z1720 (talk) 14:54, 7 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Dissident93 made some edits to Template:CFB Yearly Record Subhead and Template:CFB Yearly Record End yesterday that removed gray background coloring for heading and total rows in the college football head coaching record tables. This has something do with rendering in light-on-dark color scheme ("dark mode") it seems. The gray background color is still present in the analogous templates for college basketball head coaching record tables. Doggie Julian#Head coaching record is a good example where you can compare the two. I certainly think the tables look better with the gray shading. Dissident93, can you explain what the problem was with the "dark mode"? Is there a way we could keep the gray shading by default, but change things as needed for dark mode? I know you also have some more general concerns about the layout of these tables. Jweiss11 (talk) 19:54, 7 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
There is a discussion occurring at the CBB wikiproject that raises the same question for CFB.
Wikipedia talk:WikiProject College basketball#Are redshirts who didn't play considered national champions?
PK-WIKI (talk) 02:32, 9 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
"could trump that by winning a national championship ring to match the one he received as a redshirt freshman in 2002."
The "bowl games" parameter at {{Infobox college football player}} (example usage Kyren Lacy) seems like clutter that fails to impart relatively meaningful information unique to that individual player; it's far more of a team accomplishment than a player accomplishment. To me, it would be like if NFL players had a "playoff finishes" parameter showing the result of their final playoff game each year they appeared. I'm inclined to remove it, but would be curious as to what others think first. I checked the talk and archives of both this project and the template, and couldn't find prior discussions about this. Left guide (talk) 06:50, 14 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard#Are 'Sports-Reference.com' websites reliable sources for redshirt seasons and awards?. PK-WIKI (talk) 17:54, 15 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]
1899 Sewanee was demoted from GA to C. A part of me understands, but another part finds it hard to add anything more. What can be done to improve the article? The team deserves a proper article. Also, what is Fuzzy trying to say about Suter? I think that's the only thing hurting the article. If that were clarified, I'd be more bitter about the demotion. Any help appreciated. One thing to add might be the film Unrivaled suggests the reason for Sewanee's road trip was the disputed baseball title with Texas. Cake (talk) 04:28, 18 April 2025 (UTC)[reply]