As you probably know, there are three main governing bodies that run college sports in the United States. The most famous one is obviously the NCAA, with its three divisions. The other two are the NAIA and the NJCAA, which is the organization that runs all sports at the junior college level. Now, all of these leagues have different rules and also have different scholarship amounts that they allow per team (and in every sport), which is something we will go into more detail in a future blog post. However, in this article we want to give you some numbers so you can better understand the size of each division and so you have a better understanding of how competitive each league or division is. So here are the numbers for every single one of the five main divisions:
NCAA Division 1: 363 schools and about 200,000 student-athletes across all sports
NCAA Division 2: 313 schools and about 125,000 student-athletes across all sports
NCAA Division 3: 436 schools and about 200,000 student-athletes across all sports
NAIA: 250 schools and about 80,000 student-athletes (40% increase in the past 5 years)
NJCAA: 525 schools and about 70,000 student-athletes
As you can see from these numbers, there are plenty of opportunities available with almost 2000 schools offering athletics and roughly 675,000 spots for student-athletes. Now remember, NCAA Division 3 is the only division that does not allow to offer any sort of athletic scholarships, so competing in that division usually comes at a slightly higher price on average. However, very often you can make up for that with good grades and test scores, as you might qualify for an academic scholarship to cover some of your costs at these schools.
If you have any questions about the different divisions or governing bodies, please don’t hesitate to reach out to us anytime. If you are interested in scheduling a FREE EVALUATION call with us to see which division might be the best match for you, just fill out our contact form below and we will be in touch with you soon to arrange a day and time to speak with you and your parents!