“Nobody Wants It”: ESPN’s Rece Davis Doesn’t Hold Back on NCAA Over Controversial Punt Rule Change

College football coaches argue about almost everything. They argue about playoff formats. They argue about NIL. They argue about recruiting calendars, transfer portal windows, kickoff times, and targeting calls. But every once in a while, something happens that unites almost the entire sport. That’s precisely what happened with the NCAA’s new punt formation rule for the 2026 season. And coaches absolutely hate it.

The rule sounds small at first. It even sounds boring when read straight from the NCAA rulebook. But inside football buildings, special teams coaches reacted to it as if someone had suddenly changed the shape of the football itself. The change focuses on punt formations that involve jersey-number exceptions, especially those with players lined up near the snapper. ESPN’s Rece Davis echoed the dominant sentiment around the rule change.

“All of these coaches hate it, and for the most part, you have former coaches on the rules committee, but now they are all coaches or former coaches on the rules committee; now they all hate it,” Davis said on today’s ESPN podcast. “Why would you do it if nobody wants it? It’s like, I think (Bill) Connelly had a great line in his article.

“He was talking about the playoff, but it applies to this, too. It’s like AI; nobody asked for it. Nobody wants it, and yet you’re going to get it no matter what. It’s sort of like that $1 to Bill Connelly, but this is like the punt rule that nobody wants, nobody understands, and there appears to be no real need for it.”

Under the new rule, the snapper and the two players lined up next to him automatically become ineligible receivers on punt plays when certain numbering exceptions are used. In simple words, coaches can no longer disguise certain players as eligible receivers during fake punts like they always did. For an average fan, it might not seem much, but for coaches who have deployed those ‘disguised’ packages for decades, it’s a watershed moment. It forces them back to their drawing boards.

“There’s no compelling reason to change it. It was already perfectly fine,” Iowa head coach Kirk Ferentz said to ESPN’s Pete Thamel. “We’re not playing for a couple more months. I don’t know why they couldn’t (change it).” But it’s not only Ferentz; according to reports, the Big 10 unanimously voted 18-0 against the new rule, and among them, Ferentz was the most “animated.”

The Iowa head coach’s frustration is understandable, since he has spent his last 27 years punting to win at Iowa. No wonder he described the new rule as a “clown show.” To limit a team’s ability to disguise a fake punt in, say, a rugby formation, the NCAA has now added some strict requirements for offensive linemen in punt formations.

According to reporting shared with USA Today, an unofficial survey of Division I coaches showed a 61-1 vote against the rule. Think about that for a second. College football coaches almost never agree on anything. Getting 61 coaches on the same side of an issue is like getting rival fanbases to sing karaoke together after a loss. And that has happened owing to several other mounting concerns about the new rules.

Football Various concerns dot the horizon amid the new punt rule

Remember the 2017 Ohio State upset against Iowa? Kirk Ferentz’s team defeated Urban Meyer’s Buckeyes 55-24 and used various fake-punt and fake-kick packages. In a crucial moment, Iowa ran a bizarre but well-rehearsed fake field goal where the holder flipped the ball to the snapper. And guess what? He threw a touchdown pass. With the NCAA’s new punt rule in place, coaches like Kirk Ferentz would have to ditch their 27 years’ worth of experience in dominating through special teams.

Apart from the obvious reason of coaches being forced to adopt a new strategy, the rule might actually make punts more dangerous. For instance, if defenses no longer have to anticipate fake punts, opponents can attack punters aggressively. That ‘extra’ pressure can mean more blocked punts and harder collisions. That matters because punters are among the most vulnerable players on the field during live action. And so, it goes against the NCAA’s own emphasis.

The NCAA has spent years emphasizing player safety through targeting rules and kickoff changes. Ironically, coaches now fear that this punt rule could inadvertently create dangerous situations rather than reduce them. And there is another hidden issue, too: logistics. Under the new system, some players may need to repeatedly report eligibility exceptions to officials before punts. Furthermore, constant communication with referees could slow games down and create confusion during high-pressure moments.