2021 NCAA Division I FCS football season

The 2021 NCAA Division I FCS football season, part of college football in the United States, was organized by the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) at the Division I Football Championship Subdivision (FCS) level.
After the prior season was impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States, resulting in some conferences canceling their seasons and significant rescheduling by other conferences, the 2021 season returned to its traditional fall scheduling. The season ended with a single-elimination tournament, with North Dakota State winning the championship game on January 8, 2022 at Toyota Stadium in Frisco, Texas.
Conference changes and new programs.
Membership changes for 2021.
On January 14, 2021, the Western Athletic Conference, which had last played football in the 2012 season as an FBS league, announced that it would reinstate football in the fall 2021 season as an FCS league. This coincides with the arrival of four new members from the Southland Conference, all located in Texas and fielding FCS football programs—Abilene Christian, Lamar, Sam Houston State, and Stephen F. Austin. Original plans were for the four Southland members, as well as Big Sky Conference member Southern Utah, to join in 2022, at which time the football league would restart. However, the entry of the Texas schools and the restart of football were moved forward to July 2021 when the Southland chose to expel its departing members. These schools will join Dixie State and Tarleton State, which joined the all-sports WAC in July 2020, in the revived WAC football league. Southern Utah's entry remains on the original July 2022 schedule. On the same day, UTRGV, currently a full but non-football WAC member, announced that it planned to launch an FCS football program no later than 2024. While it did not mention a conference affiliation, its existing WAC membership makes it all but certain that the school will join WAC football.
On January 29, 2021, the ASUN Conference announced that it too would begin sponsoring FCS football in 2022, with its first five members being full members Kennesaw State and North Alabama (who had been football-only members of the Big South Conference), Eastern Kentucky and Jacksonville State from the Ohio Valley Conference, and Central Arkansas from the Southland Conference. On February 23, the ASUN announced that it had entered into a football partnership with the WAC, with the WAC's four incoming Texas members joined by the incoming ASUN schools in a round-robin league officially branded as the "ASUN–WAC Challenge" or "WAC–ASUN Challenge". Dixie State and Tarleton were to be included in alliance members' schedules, but not in alliance standings due to their ongoing Division I transitions, technically making them FCS independents for at least the 2021 season. While the ASUN–WAC Challenge was organized with seven members, meeting the NCAA-imposed minimum of six playoff-eligible schools for an automatic FCS tournament bid, it did not meet the NCAA's "continuity" criterion for eligibility, based on the length of time the member schools have been in the same league. ASUN and WAC jointly proposed an amendment to NCAA bylaws to make the partnership eligible for an automatic bid. Their proposal was successful, resulting in an automatic qualifier to the postseason tournament from the seven-team Challenge, colloquially referred to as "AQ7".
Future membership changes.
On September 17, the ASUN announced that Austin Peay would move from the OVC to the ASUN effective July 1, 2022. Peay will become the ASUN's sixth scholarship FCS football program, joining the three 2021 arrivals and current Big South football associates Kennesaw State and North Alabama. This in turn enables the ASUN to launch its football league in 2022 with an automatic bid to the FCS playoffs, as North Alabama will complete its transition from Division II to Division I in July 2022 and become playoff-eligible. Texas A&amp;M–Commerce will also be moving to the Southland Conference from the Lone Star Conference starting in July 2022.
On October 22, The Action Network reported that James Madison was on the verge of joining the FBS Sun Belt Conference alongside three members of another FBS league, Conference USA. On November 6, James Madison made its move to the Sun Belt official, effective no later than July 2023. The Dukes had been scheduled to play as FBS independents in the 2022 season.
On November 5, Conference USA, which had nine of its schools depart to other separate conferences, handed out invitations to two of its four newcomer universities, FCS programs Jacksonville State and Sam Houston. They were both accepted and their C-USA membership takes effect also no later than July 2023.
One week later on November 12, the Western Athletic Conference announced that Incarnate Word would join from the Southland after the 2021–22 school year. The Southland also nearly lost McNeese to the WAC, but the Cowboys ultimately remained in the Southland. In late June 2022, the Incarnate Words announced, they will no longer join the WAC, and commit to staying in the Southland Conference.
Rule changes.
The following rule changes, recommended by the NCAA Football Rules Committee for the 2021 season on March 12 of that year, were approved by the NCAA Playing Rules Oversight Panel on April 22.
One recommended change that would have limited blocks below the waist to inside the tackle box was not approved.
Another rule change was made during the season:
"Points of Emphasis" for the 2021 season include:
Kickoff games.
"Week Zero".
The regular season began with three games on Saturday, August 28:
Upsets.
This section lists instances of unranked teams defeating ranked teams during the season.
Regular season.
During the regular season, 33 unranked teams have defeated a ranked team.
Regular season top 10 matchups.
Rankings reflect the Stats Perform Poll.
Rankings.
The top 25 from the Stats Perform and USA Today Coaches Polls.
Postseason.
After the prior season's playoffs were reduced to a 16-team bracket, FCS returned to a 24-team bracket for this season: 11 of the teams were decided via automatic bids issued to conference champions (listed below) and 13 teams were determined via at-large bids; the top eight teams were seeded.
NCAA Division I playoff bracket.
Source:
Coaching changes.
Preseason and in-season.
This is restricted to coaching changes that took place on or after May 1, 2021. For coaching changes that occurred earlier in 2021, see 2020 NCAA Division I FCS end-of-season coaching changes.