2025 Division III Football Playoff Tracker (NPI Updates)

November 9, 2025

With each and every game played throughout the season the 2025 Division III football playoff picture changes and comes closer into view. This will be your home to track the developing playoff picture with live NPI updates as results roll in through the final Saturday, ultimately locking into place when the last game goes final.

To make clear which games have been included, we will run NPI updates in batches as groups of games go final based on kickoff time. Any exceptions will be noted as we are not going to hold a group of games up because of a weather delay or extended overtime.

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Week 11 Start times (All times Eastern)
Pending: None
Partial/in-progress: None
Included: Friday night, 11am, 12pm, 12:30pm. 1pm, 1:30pm, 2pm, 3pm, 4pm, 9pm

At-Large Bids
The race for the 13 at-large (Pool C) bids to the 2025 Division III Football Playoffs. Here we will show the top 20 teams who have not been assigned (whether projected or actually won) their conferences automatic qualifier and will need to rely on an at-large berth to make the playoff field. At-large bids are awarded solely on the final NPI rankings.

Playoff Picture
Current playoff picture based on only teams in position for a playoff berth. This includes automatic qualifiers (Pool A) plus the next 13 in the current NPI rankings as playoff at-large (Pool C) qualifiers. AQ’s not officially clinched are assigned in this view based on conference winning percentage with NPI as a tiebreaker. Top 8 seeds will be “protected” from each other in the bracket such that they could not meet earlier than the quarterfinals.

NPI Resources From D3 Datacast
Complete national Division III football NPI rankings
Unpacking NPI – New Tournament Selection Metric for Division 3 Sports – Episode 83
What D3 Football Fans Should Know About NPI – Episode 89

6 responses to “2025 Division III Football Playoff Tracker (NPI Updates)”

Brian Eberwine

November 15, 2025 at 5:41 pm

UMHB: ASC co-champions and staying home for the playoffs after starting season ranked 6th nationally.

UMHB 7-3/ 5-1 with losses to ASC co champion Hardin Simmons, #18 WW-Whitewater, and D2 Mars Hill

UMHB can’t get D3 teams to play them outside of their small conference and have to play D2 and NAIA teams that don’t get figured into the mix.

Either the NCAA needs to mandate D3 schools fill out the schedule (even by lottery) or count the D2/NAIA games.

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Stephen W.

November 15, 2025 at 11:39 pm

Just wondering how last week Adrian had an adjusted 1.1 loss for a home loss vs Hope. Hope had 1.1 for road loss at Alma. Now when Adrian lost on the road at Alma they only have a total of 2.0 adj loss. How is a road loss at Alma worth .9 to Adrian but 1.1 to Hope?

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1. Zac Snyder
  
  November 15, 2025 at 11:42 pm
  
  Hope’s loss to Alma was at home, not on the road.
  
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  1. Stephen W.
    
    November 15, 2025 at 11:53 pm
    
    Yes, I guess you are correct. That is my mistake. Thanks. Just wondering how Adrian has 2 total losses by 3 total points but is 9 or 10 spots from the last at large bid. Both losses to playoff teams.
    
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  2. Zac Snyder
    
    November 16, 2025 at 12:07 am
    
    Adrian was hurt in the regard that NPI is strictly based on wins and losses rather than having a margin of victory/defeat component but what really did them in was a non-conference schedule that didn’t do anything to help build their resume and overall just two wins (Calvin at 56 and Trine at 100) over teams in the NPI top 100.
    
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Jeff T.

November 16, 2025 at 10:12 am

Congratulatins on a great season Adrian. However, if you want to get to the dance as they say you need to toughen up your schedule. A 78-0 win is nice but against who? Maybe it is time to take the program across Lake Michigan and play some of the big boys. Or visit some of the tough teams not so far away in Ohio.

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