The NCAA will have a new targeting penalty in 2026. The first foul of the season no longer follows a player into the next kickoff. The old half-game carryover is gone for a first offense.
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The NCAA Division 1 FBS Oversight Committee approved a one-year experimental targeting structure on March 19, 2026. The FCS Oversight Committee approved the same setup on March 23, 2026. The SEC Officiating account posted the update as the season began. The trial is already in.
A first targeting disqualification of the season still ends that player’s night. He can play the entire next game, but a second targeting foul means he is ejected and must miss the first half of the next game. A third means he is ejected and must miss the entire next game. The first strike is the one that changed. The first-offense carryover was the piece the governing body was willing to test.
Before 2026, a player ejected for targeting was out for the rest of that game. If the foul came in the second half, he also sat the first half of the next game. Conferences could already appeal those second-half ejections to the national coordinator of officials.
Under the rule, that extra first-half sit-out does not apply to a first targeting foul of the season. It does not matter if the hit came in the first quarter or the fourth.
The Xavier Lucas case from last winter shows the difference better. Miami cornerback was ejected for targeting in the fourth quarter of the 2025 College Football Playoff semifinal against Ole Miss. Under the old rule, he also missed the first half of the national championship game. Under the 2026 trial, that same first-offense second-half foul would still have taken him out of the Ole Miss game. He would have been eligible for the full next contest.
Officials approved the change because they say the targeting rule already improved how players tackle. The extra half-game cost for a first offense was no longer seen as necessary. They still wanted stronger penalties for players who keep doing it.
No player had three targeting fouls in 2025. In the FBS last season, 117 targeting fouls were called, and 64 of them came in the second half. Those 64 used to pull a player into the next game automatically.
A conference can start an appeal after a second targeting offense. Both plays can go to the NCAA National Coordinator of Football Officials for video review. If either call is ruled wrong, the extra next-game suspension can be vacated.
The player still served the in-game ejection. The definition of targeting is still forcible contact with the crown of the helmet, or forcible contact to the head or neck of a defenseless player, plus an indicator such as launching, leading with the head, or lowering the head.
Why the new targeting structure still ejects a player, then gives a team its starter back
Miami head coach Mario Cristobal spoke at the joint national championship press conference on January 18, 2026, about Lucas missing the first half of the title game after that fourth-quarter foul against Ole Miss.
“We feel it was unjustly administered, and now it impacts the last game of the season,” Cristobal said. He then said officials and “the powers that be” should revisit the rule “to give every team due process and their best ability to compete in this game.”
Steve Shaw, then the NCAA secretary-rules editor and national coordinator of officials, explained the experiment before the 2026 season. Shaw said the rules committee wanted, above all, “not punish players for simply making a tackle or a football play.”
“This is an experimental rule this year, and the commissioners were content (on that). They wanted to make sure this doesn’t change behavior back and start a new trend of targeting,” Shaw later added.
Shaw also stressed that replay now has to confirm every element of targeting or the call comes off. That is why the committee did not wipe out extra punishment for every offender. It only moved the extra cost to the second and third fouls.
Targeting is not the only 2026 playing-rule change
Offensive pass interference dropped from 15 yards to 10 yards. The committee said 15 yards was too harsh for a foul that is not a personal foul or unsportsmanlike act. A 10-yard flag is closer to holding. A 3rd-and-8 OPI no longer ends as many drives by itself.
A fair-catch kick was added. After a fair catch or awarded fair catch of a punt or kickoff, the receiving team can try an uncontested place-kick field goal from the spot of the catch. The defense stands 10 yards away and cannot rush. A fair catch at the opponent’s 40 with three seconds left can become a long field-goal try instead of a Hail Mary.
Coaches now get two replay challenges, and a third if either of the first two succeeds. A coach cannot challenge with no timeouts left.
Unsportsmanlike conduct now lists five automatic 15-yard flags. Pantomiming gun violence, a throat-slash or nose-wipe, removing a helmet, dead-ball pushing or shoving, and pulling an opponent off a pile after the play. Two unsportsmanlike fouls on the same player mean ejection. Teammate celebrations not aimed at an opponent are still allowed.