College football, played as RiskFBS FCS D-II D-III Carousel

The Carousel Imperialism Map

3,142 counties11 empires100 battles10 raidsFinal · Jan 10

Surveying the counties…

The FBS map without the preseason reset. Since 2014 every season opens with the borders the last one ended with, and land stays with the program when its coach leaves. The one reset is tied to coaching: a program that opens a season landless gets its home counties back if it hired a new head coach. How the reset works › Replay 2014 to today › This is the 2021 season, played to its final whistle.

Final conquests

Bowls 1

Middle Tennessee def. Toledo31–24 · Dec 17upset+39 counties
Miami (OH) def. North Texas27–14 · Dec 23+94 counties
Michigan State def. Pittsburgh31–21 · Dec 30upset+77 counties
Alabama def. Cincinnati27–6 · Dec 31+27 counties
Georgia def. Michigan34–11 · Dec 31+19 counties
Ohio State def. Utah48–45 · Jan 1+9 counties
Baylor def. Ole Miss21–7 · Jan 1upset+1,836 counties
North Dakota State def. Montana State38–10 · Jan 8raid+84 counties
Georgia def. Alabama33–18 · Jan 10upset+318 counties

Standings

The Empires

11 landholders · final

1Baylor2,363,889 mi² · 1,912 co
2Minnesota395,471 mi² · 291 co
3Utah State274,720 mi² · 130 co
4Georgia240,085 mi² · 337 co
5Michigan State113,390 mi² · 77 co
6North Dakota StateFCS66,299 mi² · 143 co
7Miami (OH)56,737 mi² · 94 co
8Louisiana50,194 mi² · 78 co
9Clemson22,321 mi² · 32 co
10Middle Tennessee16,528 mi² · 39 co
11Ohio State5,827 mi² · 9 co

‹ 2020 season 2022 season ›All-time records ›

How the carousel resets

Borders carry over. New coaches can start fresh.

No preseason reset

On the FBS map every county goes back to its nearest stadium each August. Here 2021 opens with the exact borders 2020 ended with, so empires survive the offseason.

Land stays with the program

When a head coach leaves, retires or is fired, his successor inherits whatever the program holds, big empire or nothing. A mid-season firing moves nothing either: the interim takes over the same land.

III

The coaching reset

A program that opens a season with no land gets its home counties back if it hired a new head coach, or if it just moved up to FBS. Those counties are taken from whoever held them. A landless program that keeps its coach stays landless until it wins its way back.

During the season the rules are the FBS map's: win and take everything the loser holds. Compare the 2021 FBS map › Replay every season from 2014 ›

Articles of war

How the war works

The seeding

Before a down is played, every county in the fifty states is dealt to the FBS program with the nearest stadium, measured as the crow flies from the county's geographic center. Nobody starts landless in the FBS; nobody outside it starts with anything.

The conquest

When a game goes final, the winner takes everything the loser holds at that moment: home soil and every prior conquest alike. Games are replayed in kickoff order, so an empire can rise and fall inside a single Saturday.

III

The raid

A team with no land has nothing to lose, but it can beat any landholder and take the lot. That is how FCS, Division II and Division III programs raid their way onto the map, and land taken downward can stay there all season.

On the carousel map, land carries over from season to season since 2014 and stays with the program when a coach leaves; a program that opens a season landless gets its home counties back if it hired a new head coach. Ties, unfinished games and games without a score are ignored. Territories (Puerto Rico, Guam, the Virgin Islands) are off the map. Neutral-site games overseas do not yet award foreign soil. A week appears in the timeline once its first game goes final. The current map is refreshed automatically every morning during the season. The 2021 campaign is complete. Stadium coordinates, colors and logos are today's; conference and division come from each season's own results. The full rules and methodology have the details.