Template talk:Infobox college football game

Candidate for Deletion
This template has been listed as a candidate for deletion. See the discussion at: Templates_for_deletion Group29 (talk) 02:56, 26 November 2007 (UTC)
 * A replacement template is in the works at User:Nmajdan/Test and will be implemented after the TfD has completed depending on the outcome.↔NMajdan &bull;talk 16:29, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

Given the apparent consensus of the TfD, when would be an appropriate time to implement the new design?↔NMajdan &bull;talk 14:21, 29 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Wait for the TFD to close first? MECU ≈ talk 15:59, 29 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Looks like that will be today or tomorrow. I want to make sure the closing admin doesn't delete first. Granted, I could just recover and then change but its more work.↔NMajdan &bull;talk 16:30, 29 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I think it's standard to not delete a template while it is being used. They try and orphan it first from the article space, especially in cases like this where the consensus is to redesign/replace. At least, that's the way it used to be (and should be, IMHO). MECU ≈ talk 18:16, 29 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Thats even worse. I would hate for them to have a bot go and remove all the instances of the template. I put on the page that a new version is ready to go whenever the TfD ends.↔NMajdan &bull;talk 18:33, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

NMajdan, If you put your code in place, wouldn't the reason for deletion be gone and wouldn't that close the TfD discussion? Here is the way I look at it: You put your code in and either the template gets deleted or not. If not deleted, all college football games automatically get the new template design. If deleted, all the college football games would need to be bot-replaced by whatever the name is of the new template. Group29 (talk) 18:40, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

Comments About First Draft
Wow, it's huge. It looks pretty good, but it's very large. Can you set a max width of like 700px and see how it looks then? I'm just going by the old web design adage of expecting an 800x600 viewing area...though I'm pretty sure that's way out of date, it's still a good starting point. Fonts could probably use being reduced as well. The GT/FIU one especially suffers, probably because the name and nickname are so long, so they take up most of the space. Maybe try setting the widths of the different areas, either dynamically with percentages or strictly (not as good an idea). z4ns4tsu \talk 21:59, 5 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Currently there is a 66% minimum set. Of that 66% (of the total width), 25% goes to the right and left columns and 50% to the middle. I can try the 700px max but I'll have to take the nowrap off so reducing font size will be a must. -- MECU ≈ talk 22:47, 5 December 2006 (UTC)


 * It already looks a lot better just changing the font size. z4ns4tsu \talk 23:10, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

Again, great work. Johntex\talk 02:53, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Wow. Great work.  And quick, too.  I think you are on the right track, definitely.  Three questions:
 * 1) Why does date and year have to be in two different fields?
 * 2) Can we make the final score a little more prominent? To me, it is getting lost in with the school record a bit.
 * 3) If we ever win the war to be able to use team logos in the same way every other major media outlet uses them, will we be able to adopt this to include them?

Thanks for the comments! -- MECU ≈ talk 13:53, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
 * 1) Because Date is what you see at the bottom, and should be something like October 11, 2006. Year is what is used in the BCS date for linking to that poll. If you don't use the BCS field, the Year field can be omitted. The BCS ranking links to the NCAA Division I-A football rankings. Thus I needed the two fields. I agree it's slightly less intuitive, if anyone has a better idea on where to link the ranking headers I'd be fine with that. Maybe they all should link to that season's poll since it might be more useful for the AP & Coaches Poll?
 * 2) I'm working on it. I agree it should be bigger, but just changing the font size it then goes into the other text above and below it.
 * 3) Yes. There's even a hidden note in the code on where to put it. My thoughts are that it would replace the text of the team that that's kind of duplicate (it links different for now) on the left and right sides and put the logo there. Would need some adjustment on the sizes perhaps but that would be easy. Would also need to add a few variable fields.
 * Well, I had to idea this was being developed. Definitely an interesting infobox; never seen anything like it myself. One issue I noticed. Is there anyway you could permanently line up the team names and records at the top? I noticed that when one team has, say, only one rankings while the other has three, then they are no longer aligned. I haven't looked at the code myself but this may be achieved simply by adding a valign="top" somewhere. The problem can be seen on the 2006 Alamo Bowl article. I've started putting this on a few pages.--NMajdan &bull;talk 19:14, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
 * I think I took care of it.--NMajdan &bull;talk 19:29, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
 * I like it. Maybe the record should be enlarged just a little? Maybe non-bolded it wouldn't distract from the final score too much then either? -- MECU ≈ talk 21:28, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

Problem with BCS ranking?
Hi Mecu, I added this excellent template to 2006 Rose Bowl and all went well except for the BCS ranking. If I include it, I get some wiki-markup showing in the article. Do you know how we can fix this? Johntex\talk 20:39, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Johntex, it appears the issue was with the "Year" variable. You wikilinked the year when it shouldn't be. I took care of it.--NMajdan &bull;talk 20:44, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Yah, I guess the user directions aren't a clear as they could be. I'll work on that. -- MECU ≈ talk 21:28, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
 * My bad. Thank you NMajdan.  However, the link for BCS goes to the 2006 BCS rankings article, which is not the best possible link for the 2006 Rose Bowl, which really was part of the 2005 season.  What should we do about this?  Thanks, Johntex\talk 21:36, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Well, that would be my bad. Thats what the "Year" field is for. It specifies what year should be linked for the Rankings page. I changes the value on that page from 2006 to 2005 which should resolve the issue.--NMajdan &bull;talk 21:46, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

Bonus "Feature"
If you look at Fifth Down, you can see for the stadium= field I put "Faurot Field in Columbia, Missouri" which I think looks a little nicer then as it also gives the location of the game in the USA as well as the field. I didn't intend it that way, but it works quite well it seems. -- MECU ≈ talk 21:28, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

Inappropriate
This template takes up the entire width of the page, at least for me. The style doesn't seem proper for an encyclopedia at all, it's more like a sports web page. Can't we fit all this information into an Infobox-size column at the side? Night Gyr (talk/Oy) 03:59, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Are you saying the template on the template page takes up your whole screen, or the template used in an article? On the template page, it is huge (don't know why), but when it is used in article namespace, it looks find. This template was agreed upon by the college football WikiProject. We feel it suits our needs perfectly. Of course, I can't speak for everybody but I'm sure a few more people will chime in as well on this discussion. What would be the difference in having this template at the top of an article as opposed to the left side? I don't see a difference. And since this template is used for football games, maybe a format like a sports site is preferably since it is what most people are used to seeing. It contains all the data it needs, position shouldn't matter too much.--<span style="font-size:11px; font-weight:bold; font-family:verdana, sans-serif;">NMajdan &bull;<span style="font-size:9px; font-family:verdana, sans-serif; color:#000000;">talk 04:08, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
 * On 2006 Alamo Bowl, it takes up the full width of the text area. It really seems to contravene house style to have something so big that it pushes the actual article text down the page and shoves information in a BIG FONT in my face.  I don't need the score in big numbers to find it.  Night Gyr (talk/Oy) 04:23, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
 * I like the fact that it spans nearly the width of the screen. I don't think it contravenese the MoS.  At this very moment, we are running a donation campaign that features a banner going horizontally across the screen at the very top of all pages.  Unlike the funds-solicitation, the game header is actually informative content.  I also like the big font for the final score as it makes it easy to see the final result (and winner) at a glance. Johntex\talk 06:56, 5 January 2007 (UTC)


 * Remember what WP:IUP says: "Larger images should generally be a maximum of 550 pixels wide, so that they can comfortably be displayed on 800x600 monitors." In essence, this template is basically making the same problem. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 05:21, 9 January 2007 (UTC)


 * That IUP contradicts Guide to layout which says images should not be more than 300px and Help:Infobox states an infobox should not take up more than 1/3rd of the width, which means 266px wide (or less, with the sidebar) for a 800x600 which seems to be the concern. It would be interesting to see what screen sizes actually come to Wikipedia, but that's beyond this. This is an infobox in the loosest of classifications. Why the need to make every infobox on the right, boxy gray background redundant from article to article? Help:Infobox only claims "An infobox on Wikipedia is a consistently-formatted table which is present in articles with a common subject to provide summary information consistently between articles or improve navigation to closely related articles in that subject." This infobox fulfills that as all college football game articles should have it, and therefore provides a uniformity in presenting the most basic, critical information at the top of the page. I subject that this isn't an image, so image policies should not be relevant to it. The main issue seems to be the size and location. I looked at WP:MoS and there doesn't seem to be anything covering this. If Night Gyr could point to a more specific location on that page, or quote it here, that would be helpful. It is possible to limit the size and reduce some of the font sizes, but again, I don't see the point? Unless it overlaps other items or is too large on a 800x600 screen to force the user to scroll right (but then would depend on the content, as some team names are larger than others). Could Night Gyr upload a screen shot of the article in question to help the rest of us that don't have that problem? In short, we need more info before making changes haphazardly. -- MECU ≈ talk 14:20, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
 * As an after note, I removed the gametime from the template and it shrunk down a little. Perhaps making game time another field that is on it's own line above the date would help prevent this in the future. If Night Gyr takes a screen shot, you could look at the history before my edit to show a before and after. -- MECU ≈ talk 14:24, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
 * I have just made a change to the template to make the date/stadium variables display one above the other instead of inline with eachother. This should help keep the width down in some instances. -- MECU ≈ talk 19:28, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Good work, Mecu. Johntex\talk 19:58, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Hidden Notes
I aded a hidden note into the template saying "Team records and rankings are to be PRIOR to the game, NOT after the game." I hope I inserted it correctly so that it will appear when the template is used. I am not the template expert here, so others may want to check me. Johntex\talk 21:04, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Record going into the game, or as a result of the game?
There is some discussion here about whether the "box score" template for individual games should reflect the record of the teams coming into the game, or as a result of playing the game. Please join in the discussion if you would like. Johntex\talk 21:16, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

style usage
Johntex and I have been having an interesting debate over the usage of the over on the FAC page for 2006 Chick-fil-A Bowl (Shameless plug: stop by and leave comments if you get a chance). The debate centers around whether or not the template should uniformly head every single-game article or not.

My position is that for longer articles (like 2006 Chick-fil-A Bowl), all the information in the template is already given in the infobox and in the lede paragraphs, so there's no need to put the template at the top of longer articles. Putting it at the top forces all the other information down the page and really overshadows the infobox and the lead paragraphs. I'm not saying that the template shouldn't be included at all — in my 2006 Chick-fil-A Bowl article, I put it in the statistics section. It's a valuable way to express a lot of information in a short space, and looks pretty nice. I'm not even saying that it shouldn't head up a page — on shorter single-game articles, especially those without infoboxes, it's a great replacement for an infobox. But on longer articles, its size overwhelms the lead paragraphs of text and the lead infobox. My suggestion is that for longer articles, it should be placed at the end of the game recap section or in a separate game statistics section where it won't clutter up the top of the article and overwhelm the text.

Johntex's position (and please correct me, John) is that the template should be at the top of all single-game articles in order to achieve a common style for single-game college football articles. He feels that the template isn't distracting and doesn't overwhelm the rest of the text, even in longer articles. For an example, he suggests 2006 Alamo Bowl. John, please let me know if this is correct.

Any and all comments would be greatly appreciated. JKBrooks85 00:30, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

Reopening Team Records Discussion
It looks like a stale discussion at this point, but I didn't see a consensus reached here and this template's documentation does not describe how to use the field. Myself, it doesn't make any sense to see a team lose a game, but to see their record not reflect a loss, such as here. The ranking is the ranking for the week and does not change at the conclusion of the game. However, at the conclusion of the game, the record does change. This is also how any box score in a newspaper would report the information (see ESPN). I don't think Wikipedia should have a different standard. Any thoughts? X96lee15 (talk) 05:47, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Every single sports page I've seen uses the rankings as they were when the teams played. So, why should Wikipedia differ? Yes, we can right our own rules here, but why differ from the likes of ESPN, CBS Sports, Yahoo Sports? On your very own example, it shows Michigan as #5, which is what they were when the game was played. Other examples, USC was #1 when they played Idaho (ESPN), TCU was #19 when they played #7 Texas (Yahoo), South Florida was #2 when they played UCF (CBS Sports). So, to me, I don't see the issue. Wikipedia should stay in line with all the other sports reporting web sites. It is ok, however, to mention how the team dropped or rose in the polls following the game in the text of the article and I think that should be included. Also, make sure somewhere in the article is a link to the rankings page.↔<span style="font:bold 11px Verdana,sans-serif;">NMajdan &bull;<span style="font:9px Verdana,sans-serif; color:#000;">talk 13:26, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Dang it, I'm an idiot. I was talking about rankings not records. That is kinda confusing, the rankings are as they were before the teams played but the records are as they were after the teams played. I'm hesitant to change since that would involve changing a lot of articles so if I had to come up with a reason, it would be for simplicity sake. But, this is a more valid point than the rankings. So, I'm on the fence on this one leaning towards keeping them as they were before the game.↔<span style="font:bold 11px Verdana,sans-serif;">NMajdan &bull;<span style="font:9px Verdana,sans-serif; color:#000;">talk 14:12, 6 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Would you update the record for the current or end-of-season record? No. There's no sense in "updating" the record to include the game specified. The game wasn't played by 1-0 vs. 0-1, it was played by 0-0 and 0-0. MECU ≈ talk 14:56, 6 December 2007 (UTC)


 * Of course you wouldn't update the records continuously throughout the season or at the end of the season. Since the infobox includes the score of the game, the information in the infobox is inconsistent.  Some of it is prior to the game (the record), the rest of it after the game (score, attendance, ranking, MVP).  If the infobox did not include the score of the game, then I'd be OK with have the pre-game records.  But the way the infobox is currently presenting its information, it reads like a box score, presenting the information that occurred during the game.  It's not a preview of the game.  Because of this I believe, for example, it's confusing to see a team that lost the game in the infobox with an undefeated record.  And I'll always go back to any media outlet's box score of any game will show the teams' records as those at the conclusion of the game. X96lee15 (talk) 15:48, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

I see where X96lee15 is coming from. However, original templates have even stated to have the original record. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bcspro (talk • contribs) 00:15, 7 December 2007 (UTC)


 * I recommend using team's win-loss records before the game, rather than after it. My reason relates to a team with a long winning (or perhaps losing) streak. It is not intuitively obvious why a 2-9 team defeating a 10-1 team is encyclopedic. However, a 1-9 defeating a 10-0 team would make me think that the game might be encyclopedic, because a previously undefeated team lost. Fbdave (talk) 00:52, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Coach names request
Can we change the way the coach names are displayed so that they're displayed below the "Coach Name:" qualifier rather than next to them? Many longer coach names are running into the "Coach Name:" qualifier of the other team. I've been putting a break in front of the coaches' names in order to prevent this from happening, but it'd be nice if the code automatically did this so the editor wouldn't have to do it manually. JKBrooks85 (talk) 00:48, 22 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Personally, I like having it all on one line. But I do see the issue you are speaking of. The current code allows the editor to determine whether to have it on one line or a second line; modifying the template would force it to a second line. I would like to keep the code this way to allow the editor to choose whichever they prefer. Would that be ok with you? We can add this issue to the documentation. If more editors feel it should be changed, we can change it. What do you think?↔<span style="font:bold 11px Verdana,sans-serif;">NMajdan &bull;<span style="font:9px Verdana,sans-serif; color:#000;">talk 03:52, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

Image sizing problems.
Can we tweak the template to add an image sizing parameter? Look at 2008 Las Vegas Bowl. The logo is WAY too big, and I have tried using standard sizing methods, by changing the image parameter to and  , but neither fixed the problem. It appears the template ignores image formatting and just puts the full-sized image in regardless. Could someone look into this, and either propose a fix to the Las Vegas Bowl article OR tweak the template so this works right? Thanks! --Jayron32. talk . contribs 18:54, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

Odds
See the WT:CFB discussion before modifying or discussing here. Thanks much, Group29 (talk) 02:53, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

Mod for historical "two-halves" football games?
If you go back far enough, football games were two halves, not four quarters. I've gotten around this by installing HTML-based code in the articles (amateur, I know) to resemble this template but with just three columns for scores (1-2-Total). I'm no template-writing guru, but is there a way to toggle the 3rd and 4th quarter fields to hide for these cases - if not, can this ability be added? Fjbfour (talk) 10:02, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

Short descriptions
I monitor Good and Featured Articles without short descriptions, with a view to adding SDs. Normally there aren't any, but 46 college football games have just appeared. Old versions no longer appear to have an SD either, so I don't think it's due to edits to the articles. Could this result from recent template changes? Certes (talk) 22:23, 27 December 2022 (UTC)


 * Pinging, who seems to have more of a clue about this template than most. Certes (talk) 19:45, 2 January 2023 (UTC)
 * Probably. There are a number of templates that were recently converted to redirects to this template. I removed the shortdesc call in each of those templates because a) I didn't notice that this template didn't provide one, and b) I figured that some of the games would already have a shortdesc hardcoded, so adding a second wouldn't be ideal. If you go to the history of each template you should see the shortdesc that was used before it was converted, but it might make more sense to add a shortdesc to this template (so that non-GA/FA pages will also have them).
 * As a stopgap I have added  but I'm happy to adjust it if desired. Primefac (talk) 20:59, 2 January 2023 (UTC)
 * Thanks. Both reports are now clear (after I fixed one unrelated case). Certes (talk) 22:49, 2 January 2023 (UTC)

"MVP" naming
Current key is  and it prints "MVP" in the infobox.

However various bowl games give different awards. The Rose Bowl is the "Player of the Game" and the Sugar Bowl is "Most Outstanding Player", abbreviated as "MOP" on the broadcast.

Should the infobox print the correct title of the game's MVP award?

PK-WIKI (talk) 22:20, 2 January 2024 (UTC)
 * Not unreasonable. I have added in a MVP_label parameter. Primefac (talk) 12:32, 3 January 2024 (UTC)