College football is gridiron football that is played by teams of amateur student-athletes at universities and colleges. It was through collegiate competition that gridiron football first gained popularity in the United States.
Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 players each, who almost exclusively use their feet to propel a ball around a rectangular field called a pitch. The objective of the game is to score more goals than the opposing team by moving the ball beyond the goal line into a rectangular-framed goal defended by the opposing team. Traditionally, the game has been played over two 45-minute halves, for a total match time of 90 minutes. With an estimated 250 million players active in over 200 countries and territories, it is the world's most popular sport.
The Fédération Internationale de Football Association, more commonly known by its acronym FIFA, is the international self-regulatory governing body of association football, beach soccer, and futsal. It was founded in 1904 to oversee international competition among the national associations of Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, and Switzerland. Headquartered in Zurich, Switzerland, its membership now comprises 211 national associations. These national associations must also be members of one of the six regional confederations: CAF (Africa), AFC, UEFA (Europe), CONCACAF, OFC (Oceania), and CONMEBOL.
The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league composed of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the major professional sports leagues in the United States and Canada and the highest professional level of American football in the world. Each NFL season begins annually with a three-week preseason in August, followed by the 18-week regular season, which runs from early September to early January, with each team playing 17 games and having one bye week. Following the conclusion of the regular season, seven teams from each conference, including four division winners and three wild card teams, advance to the playoffs, a single-elimination tournament, which culminates in the Super Bowl, played in early February between the winners of the AFC and NFC championship games.
The Union of European Football Associations is one of six continental bodies of governance in association football. It governs football, futsal and beach football in Europe and the transcontinental countries of Turkey, Azerbaijan, Georgia and Kazakhstan, as well as the West Asian countries of Cyprus, Armenia and Israel. UEFA consists of 55 national association members. Since 2022, due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, FIFA and UEFA suspended all Russian national teams and clubs from any FIFA and UEFA competitions.
The English Football League Cup, often referred to as the League Cup and currently known as the Carabao Cup for sponsorship reasons, is an annual knockout competition in men's domestic football in England. Organised by the English Football League (EFL), it is open to any club within the top four levels of the English football league system—92 clubs in total—comprising the top-level Premier League, and the three divisions of the English Football League's own league competition.
Monday Night Football is the branding used for broadcasts of National Football League (NFL) games that air on Monday nights. It originally ran on ABC from 1970 to 2005, before moving exclusively to sister network ESPN from 2006 to 2019. While still airing on ESPN, MNF returned to ABC in 2020 beginning with select ESPN simulcasts, later expanding to select ABC exclusive telecasts in 2022, and since 2023 ABC has aired the bulk of the games in simulcast with ESPN. In addition, ESPN2 features the Manningcast alternate telecast of select games, which was established in 2020, and since 2021, ESPN+ has served as the U.S. streaming home of MNF.
The Ballon d'Or is an annual football award presented by French magazine France Football since 1956 to honour the player deemed to have performed the best over the previous season.
Randy Gene Moss is an American former professional football wide receiver who played in the National Football League (NFL) for 14 seasons with the Minnesota Vikings, Oakland Raiders, New England Patriots, Tennessee Titans, and San Francisco 49ers. Widely regarded as one of the greatest wide receivers of all time, he holds the NFL single-season touchdown reception record, as well as the NFL single-season touchdown reception record for a rookie.
The English football league system, also known as the football pyramid, is a series of interconnected leagues for men's association football clubs in England, with five teams from Wales, one from Guernsey, one from Jersey and one from the Isle of Man also competing. The system has a hierarchical format with promotion and relegation between leagues at different levels, allowing even the smallest club the theoretical possibility of ultimately rising to the very top of the system, the Premier League. Below that are levels 2–4 organised by the English Football League, then the National League System from levels 5–10 administered by the FA, and thereafter Regional feeder leagues run by relevant county FAs on an ad hoc basis. It also often happens that the Premier Division of a Regional Feeder League has its constitution given to it by the FA. They have to accept it or appeal but cannot reject it at an annual general meeting.
NCAA Division I (D-I) is the highest level of intercollegiate athletics sanctioned by the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) in the United States, which accepts players globally. D-I schools include the major collegiate athletic powers, with large budgets, more elaborate facilities and more athletic scholarships than Division II and Division III as well as many smaller schools committed to the highest level of intercollegiate competition.
The English Football League Championship, known simply as the Championship and for sponsorship purposes as Sky Bet Championship, is a professional Association football league in England and Wales. EFL Championship is the highest division of the English Football League (EFL) and second-highest overall in the English football league system, after the Premier League, and is contested by 24 clubs.
The English Football League One, known as Sky Bet League One for sponsorship purposes or simply League One is a professional Association football league in England. EFL One is the second-highest division of the English Football League and the third-tier overall in the English football league system, after the Premier League and the EFL Championship and is contested by 24 clubs.
The Notre Dame Fighting Irish football team is the college football team representing the University of Notre Dame in Notre Dame, Indiana, north of the city of South Bend, Indiana. The team plays its home games at the campus's Notre Dame Stadium, which has a capacity of 77,622. Notre Dame is one of three schools that competes as an Independent at the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) level; however, they play five games a year against opponents from the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC), of which Notre Dame is a member in all other sports except ice hockey.
The NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS), formerly known as Division I-A, is the highest level of college football in the United States. The FBS consists of the largest schools in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). As of the 2024 season, there are 10 conferences and 134 schools in FBS.
A national championship in the highest level of college football in the United States, currently the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS), is a designation awarded annually by various organizations to their selection of the best college football team. Division I FBS football is the only National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) sport for which the NCAA does not host a yearly championship event. As such, it is sometimes referred to as a "mythical national championship".
American football, referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada and also known as gridiron football, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team with possession of the oval-shaped football, attempts to advance down the field by running with the ball or throwing it, while the defense, the team without possession of the ball, aims to stop the offense's advance and to take control of the ball for themselves. The offense must advance the ball at least ten yards in four downs or plays; if they fail, they turn over the football to the defense, but if they succeed, they are given a new set of four downs to continue the drive. Points are scored primarily by advancing the ball into the opposing team's end zone for a touchdown or kicking the ball through the opponent's goalposts for a field goal. The team with the most points at the end of the game wins.
Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word football generally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly called football include association football ; Australian rules football; Gaelic football; gridiron football ; International rules football; rugby league football; and rugby union football. These various forms of football share, to varying degrees, common origins and are known as "football codes".
The College Football Playoff (CFP) is an annual postseason knockout invitational tournament to determine a national champion for the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS), the highest level of college football competition in the United States. It culminates in the College Football Playoff National Championship game. The inaugural tournament was held at the end of the 2014 NCAA Division I FBS football season under a four-team format. The CFP Board of Managers voted in 2023 to expand the playoff to twelve teams beginning in 2024, an arrangement that will last at least through the end of the 2025 season. After 2025, the current contract between all major entities expires and a new contract will be drawn up, with indications that additional expansion to a 14-team playoff or larger may take place at that time.
