The College Numbers Breakdown

Through all the discussion of which college conferences will join which college umbrella organization, we at Goff Rugby Report felt it was time once again to look at who is going where.

To do that we took official announcements, a little rumor, and plenty of analysis and guesswork to come up with some numbers.

We have moved some conferences from NCR to unattached because it's now reasonable to assume that at least some of the western small-college conferences might find another home given that NCR has committed to fall 15s championships. We have an asterisk on Liberty and Rugby East because it's highly possible that one or two of the teams from those conferences will opt for a different home. Four teams in Liberty—AIC, Northeastern, SUNY Oswego, and Boston College—would be leaving D1A earlier than contracted if they moved to NCR, and there's a fee for that early exit that the universities promised to pay. So we'll see if they make the move or not. 

Here's our overall breakdown of teams and players per umbrella organization.

Estimated Future College Totals
Group	Players	Teams
NCR	13634	513
CRAA	5904	151
ACRA	1860	62
NIRA	828	23
Unnamed Men/s D1	2226	53
Currently Unattached	2966	97
Total	27418	899

These numbers do not include the small-college teams that aren't verified as being viable (the old NSCRO numbers had as many as 237 men's small-college teams, but we went through that list and there are a lot of "pending" teams). Our estimates of players is low. We went through a long list of rosters and came up with average roster sizes. With the COVID-19 pandemic throwing everything into doubt, we decided to err on the side of being cautious. So when a conference might have had an average roster size of 30, we've dropped it to 27. The largest roster-per-team conference, the Liberty, remains so, but at a lower level than in 2019-2020.

These numbers are also completely unrelated to what is probably going to happen in 2020-2021. Take these to be relevant for the fall of 2021.

Here's the breakdown by umbrella organization:

NCR
Division	Conferences	Teams	Est. Players
D1A Men	Liberty*	19	1121
D1 Men	MARC, Chesapeake	17	590
D1 Elite Women	X	X	X
D1 Women	Midwest	4	100
D2 Women	Great Waters, Upstate NY, Ohio Valley, Allegheny, Northern Lights, Illinois, SARC	50	1250
D2 Men	Great Lakes, Great MW, Cardinals, Gateway, MCRC, Southern, Allegheny, Northern Lights, Deep South, MARC, Tri-State, NEWCRC, Rocky Mountain	98	2768
D3 or Small-College Women	Allegheny, Carolinas, Capital, Cascades, Colonial Coast, East Penn, Great Waters, Illinois, Northern Lights, Ohio Valley, Pacific Desert, Prairie States, RNE, Texas, Tri-State, Upstate NY, Independents	160	3680
Small-College Men	Cardinals, Chicago, Colonial Coast, Deep South, Dixie, Florida, Georgia, Great Lakes, Mid-America, Mid-Atlantic, Midwest, Minnesota, New England, Potomac, Southern, Three Rivers, Tri-State, Upstate NY, Wisconsin	165	4125
Total	65	513	13634
CRAA
Division	Conferences	Teams	Est. Players
D1A Men	California, PAC, Mid-South, Red River, Rocky Mountain, Independents, Big 10, Rugby East*	40	2320
D1 Men	X	X	X
D1 Elite Women	Independents	4	170
D1 Women	Big 10, Blue Ridges, Florida, Northeast, Pacific Desert, Pacific Mountain, Rocky Mountain, Texas, Independents	68	2244
D2 Women	Capital, Carolinas, Florida, SIRC, Pacific Desert	39	1170
D2 Men	X	X	X
D3 or Small-College Women	X	X	X
Small-College Men	X	X	X
Total	24	151	5904
ACRA
Division	Conferences	Teams	Est. Players
D1A Men	X	X	X
D1 Men	X	X	X
D1 Elite Women	X	X	X
D1 Women	X	X	X
D2 Women	Tri-State, NEWCRC, MARC, RNE	62	1860
D2 Men	X	X	X
D3 or Small-College Women	X	X	X
Small-College Men	X	X	X
Total	4	62	1860
NIRA
Division	Conferences	Teams	Est. Players
D1A Men	X	X	X
D1 Men	X	X	X
D1 Elite Women	X	X	X
D1 Women	NCAA D1	8	296
D2 Women	NCAA D2	7	252
D2 Men	X	X	X
D3 or Small-College Women	NCAA D3	8	280
Small-College Men	X	X	X
Total	3	23	828
Unnamed Men's D1
Division	Conferences	Teams	Est. Players
D1A Men	X	X	X
D1 Men	MAC, Heart of America, NCRC, Lonestar, Gold Coast, Pac West, Florida	53	2226
D1 Elite Women	X	X	X
D1 Women	X	X	X
D2 Women	X	X	X
D2 Men	X	X	X
D3 or Small-College Women	X	X	X
Small-College Men	X	X	X
Total	7	53	2226
Unattached or Undeclared
Division	Conferences	Teams	Est. Players
D1A Men	X	X	X
D1 Men	SCRC, Ivy League, Independants (Iowa Central, Univ. Notre Dame)	18	756
D1 Elite Women	X	X	X
D1 Women	X	X	X
D2 Women	Cascade, Great Lakes, Lonestar, MAC, Rocky Mountain, West Coast, SoCal	42	1260
D2 Men	SCRC, Independents, Rocky Mountain	15	400
D3 or Small-College Women	X	X	X
Small-College Men	Lonestar, NCRC, NorCal	22	550
Total	11	97	2966