Florida A&M football refuses to let its 2026 postseason ban have a crippling impact on the field.
The NCAA Level-Two-sanctioned Rattlers have checkpoints they want to hit while competing amidst their Academic Progress Rate postseason ban.
Top of mind is outplaying its fourth-place preseason Southwestern Athletic Conference East ranking among six teams and a 10th-place finish in the inaugural Black College Football top 10 preseason poll. FAMU will also begin the season unranked in the Division I Football Championship Subdivision polls.
“What we can’t do is just compete in the SWAC championship game and the Celebration Bowl,” first-year head coach Quinn Fordham Gray Sr. told reporters on Wednesday, July 15, during the SWAC Football Media Day Kickoff virtual session.
“We can still be number one in the SWAC East. We can still be number one in the HBCU poll. We can still be ranked in the FCS poll.”
APR is an NCAA Division I metric to monitor the academic eligibility, retention, and graduation of student-athletes, with a required score of 930. In seasons predating Gray’s December 2025 hire, the Rattlers’ multiyear average fell short of that.
In response, the Rattlers were hit with NCAA APR penalties in April that banned them from postseason play, including the SWAC title game, the Celebration Bowl, and the FCS playoffs.
The untimeliness allowed seniors and players with one year of eligibility remaining to enter the NCAA Transfer Portal, even after it had already closed in January. Gray said they only lost two players.
“The APR sanctions aren’t something we’re focused on because once we got the news and we understood what it looked like, we gave our players about a week to deal with their feelings and hop in the portal,” Gray said. “Once they decided to stay, we helped them understand that we ain’t looking back and not going to allow that to be a crutch for anything we do moving forward.”
It’s a foregone conclusion that FAMU won’t be hoisting any trophies in 2026, unless it’s in regular-season neutral-site games, the Orange Blossom Classic against the defending Celebration Bowl champions, South Carolina State, on Sept. 6, or the Florida Classic against heated rivals Bethune-Cookman on Nov. 21.
But the Rattlers can play spoiler for Black College Football national title hopefuls like South Carolina State and SWAC foes Alabama State and Jackson State, who both chose FAMU to host for their homecoming games.
Signature wins against those teams could propel the Rattlers in the SWAC and HBCU rankings during the season and wash a sour taste from FAMU’s mouth after going 5-7 last season under former head coach James Colzie III.
“At the end of the day, there are still things that we can accomplish, still goals and targets we can try to hit and obtain,” Gray added. “So there’s still a lot to play for.”
Florida A&M football 2026 schedule
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Gerald Thomas, III, is a multi-time national award-winning reporter for his coverage of the Florida A&M Rattlers at the Tallahassee Democrat.
Follow his award-winning coverage on RattlerNews.com and contact him via email at GDThomas@Tallahassee.com or on the app formerly known as Twitter @3peatgee.
This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: FAMU football won’t let NCAA postseason ban become a crutch
Reporting by Gerald Thomas III, Tallahassee Democrat / Tallahassee Democrat
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By Gerald Thomas III, Tallahassee Democrat | USA TODAY Network
