The New NCAA
The NCAA is set to meet this coming month about potential changes to their eligibility rules. This is going to have an enormous impact on the future of youth sports, and you need to understand what this all means.
The New NCAA
Over the past six years the NCAA has changed from an amateur sports governing body, to what’s basically a professional sports league. We can debate if that’s a good or bad thing all day long, but it won’t change that fact moving forward. The highest performers are now collecting paychecks that total more than league active minimum at the next level. Everything’s changed.
Personally, I’m a fan of the new moves. For far too long universities were making cash hand over fist on the backs of athletes, some of whom will end up with life long orthopedic problems due to their time playing. Never truly being compensated other than receiving the opportunity to obtain a degree that seems to mean less and less as time marches on.
Good, bad, or indifferent, athletes can now make money on their Name/Image/Likeness and can receive funds directly from the school via revenue sharing programs. And now, the NCAA is about to change everything about eligibility for the athletes.
Name, Image, and Likeness Deals
The new Name, Image, and Likeness (NIL) rules came about due to a lawsuit filed by former NBA star Ed O’Bannon in 2015. This was an antitrust lawsuit filed by O’Bannon on behalf of former NCAA basketball and football players. One day, he was playing EA Sports’ NCAA Basketball and was playing with one of the legacy teams, which happened to be from one of the years he played at UCLA (1995 NCAA Champion team). Without getting too deep into the weeds here, he basically saw that they were using his image to generate revenue for the NCAA and he wasn’t seeing any of it. He was able to play as himself in the game, but never received any royalty checks. He was reasonably upset by this.
This lawsuit was originally directed at former players whose NIL were being used in the game, but the quickly turned into a current NCAA athlete issue as the NCAA was profiting off the current players in these games. They tried to skirt around this by naming the players random names, but if you knew the rosters and these players, then you knew exactly who each player in the game was. They often even looked exactly like the collegiate players.
Long story short, O’Bannon won and we lost EA NCAA games for quite some time, and the courts ruled that the NCAA had to compensate these players if they were going to use their NIL. This originally opened the door for athletes to be able to sign endorsement deals, and make a cut of video games, and merch. However, it quickly opened the door for what came next in 2025 which was revenue sharing which we’ll talk about next.
But before we hop into that, understand that NIL and revenue sharing are totally different, and while they both put money into the pockets of the athletes, the source of the revenue is very, very different.
Revenue Sharing
Starting in 2025, the NCAA began allowing revenue sharing straight from athletics departments to the athletes. Schools are allowed to pay up to the average Power Four revenue, which is 22.3M dollars per year. There is a 4% increase each year, and they believe that by the year 2032, athletics departments will be able to give as much as 33M dollars to the athletes directly. There is a review of this increase every three years though, which would impact how much goes to the athletes.
This doesn’t mean every school has to share this much, or even share any at all. But, it does allow the athletes at larger schools (and smaller schools trying to compete) to start to receive payments. This means that schools with larger budgets will be giving more money, which means these schools will be able to win the recruiting battle and get the best athletes to commit.
Athletics departments and sports teams aren’t required to spread this money out evenly among the athletes. For example, if USF maxed out revenue sharing (which they have) they could give out the entirety of the cash to football, and the football team could give the entirety of that money to one player. There are no real rules here, although schools still have to adhere to Title IX rules. so most schools make funds available across the board for the most part.
While there’s no real distribution rules, most schools will spend the lion’s share on the revenue generating sports, and leave little to no money for the sports that cost athletics departments money or are break even sports. Most schools will be some variant of the following:
Football - 75%
Men’s basketball - 15%
Women’s basketball - 5%
All other sports combined - 5%
This means that if a school maxes out revenue sharing, their payouts will look like this:
Football - $15,375,000
Men’s basketball - $3,075,000
Women’s basketball - $1,025,000
All other sports combined - $1,025,000
NCAA Division I football rosters are on average 120 players, with at most 85 of them being on scholarships. Non scholarship players more than likely won’t be in on the revenue sharing program, so you can assume this money will be distributed among the 85 players. If it was equally spread out, then each player would recieve ~$181,000 per year. For men’s basketball there is a hard roster cap at 15, with all 15 being eligible to be scholarship athletes. If basketball were to spread this money out evenly then each player would receive ~$205,000. Women’s basketball has the same sized rosters, so on. average they would receive ~$68,000. This is reflective of the amount of potential revenue these teams bring in. Athletics departments are going to spend the most money on the sports that bring in the most money.
None of this is guaranteed though. But this does give universities a bargaining chip to use when it comes time to try too land high level recruits. This has completely changed how NCAA DI sports function where athletes are now essentially contract employees of the university, instead of amateur athletes. For better or worse, this has completely changed the recruiting process where kids are open to the highest bidder, and not necessarily the best opportunities for themselves to develop.
When you see the exorbitant amount of cash some of these athletes are making, the majority of it is coming from NIL deals though, and not revenue sharing directly from the university. But, if you played men’s basketball for four years, you’d bring in (on average) around 800k during your collegiate career. If you’re not a dummy with your money, that’s a great financial place to start upon graduating.
The Portal
With the new revenue sharing and NIL rules in place, the NCAA also saw it fit to give these athletes even more rights with the creation of the transfer portal. In the past, you were always free to transfer from one program to another, but you were forced to sit out for a season when doing so unless you were transferring to a school that had a graduate program that your current school did not have, and this was only allowed upon completing your undergraduate work at your first institution. So, while transferring was allowed, it was disadvantageous for both the athlete, and their new school.
Today, athletes can transfer from one program to another penalty free. While I believe this was a good thing, it’s come with some downsides as well. Prior to the portal, if your coach was fired or quit, you were not allowed to leave without penalty. This meant that when a new coach came in, if they didn’t have a role for you or you didn’t fit into their gameplan, you could be SOL. This new move is great for the athlete.
However, there is no limit to the amount of transfers an athlete can have. In theory, this is great for athletes who continue to develop while in college. You could start out at a G5 school, and then transfer to a P4 school. In practice, this has turned into athletes leaving at the first sign of trouble, or leaving for more money.
Another unintended consequence of the portal has been that there are fewer spots open for incoming freshmen. As a college athletics coach, why would you potentially waste a roster spot and/or scholarship on an unproven 18 year old fresh out of high school, when you could just as easily pluck someone who’s proven themselves at the NCAA level from the portal? To get a NCAA DI P4 offer today, you have too be an unbelievable talent. Schools at this level don’t have time to develop you, they’re investing tens to hundreds of millions (even billions really) of dollars into these programs, and they have to win now. Especially now that private equity firms are getting involved. There’s a ton of pressure to win yesterday.
While I believe the portal is a major win for athletes’ rights, I also believe there needs to be some level of regulation with it. Something like one free transfer plus if/when your coach gets canned, anything more and you can sit out a year. This keeps coaches honest with their recruiting tactics, and keeps athleste engaged in the long term success of these programs. Now, we’re going to talk about the potential new eligibility rules.
New Eligibility Rule Proposal
As of right now, you get four years of eligibility plus a possible redshirt year from the first semester in which you take a full load (12 hours) of courses, even if you do not finish that semester or you drop classes. It also doesn’t matter if the courses are taken at a different university, online, or at a community/junior college. You don’t even have to be playing the sport when you start taking them.
On April 15th, 2026 the NCAA cabinet met and discussed a proposed new eligibility requirement framework. Their vote was to kick the can down the road until May 22nd instead, and vote on the new framework then. That’s a little over three weeks from the time of this writing, and the internet is abuzz with opinions on the matter.
This framework would still give you five years, but the clock would start the semester you graduate, or your 19th birthday, whichever comes first. The goal is to help keep college athletics for college aged athletes. With the money involved in university athletics right now, there’s a ton of value in taking a year off to develop, or playing a few years of pro, or reclassing and repeating 7th/8th grade (maybe both!). The NCAA wants to reel that in a little bit. The goal is to have the new framework in place at the start of the 2026/2027 academic year.
While I’m in full agreement with the new rule, there’s going to be a bunch of athletes catching strays because the NCAA has made it clear that there won’t be a grandfathering period. Who is this going to effect?
Age out junior hockey (20U) players who don’t typically enter college until 20/21 years of age. If you’re in your age out year of junior right now, you’ll enter into college with only 2-3 years of eligibility.
Kids who decided this past year to have a gap year to develop. This is common in tennis and golf.
Kids who reclassed/repeated in 7th or 8th grade in hopes to gain an edge and be older as a senior.
Kids who reclassed/repeated in prep school to play an extra year of prep school sports.
Girls who elected to play an extra year of hockey at 19U.
The new eligibility rule is meant to combat the, at times, excessive gamesmanship used by parents to give their kid an edge over others when it comes time to commit. For example, look at the average age of the roster at Indiana football this past year, it was 23 years old. The oldest player on the roster was 28 by the time they played in the College Football Playoff championship game. That older age means more experience, more strength, more speed, more time to have developed, more wisdom, etc. That’s a big deal when it comes to sports.
This rule creates a definitive line, with zero exceptions. You get four to five years of playing if you begin right after high school ends, depending on your age at graduation if you’ve reclassed or been held back at some point.
What It All Means
The NCAA today is unrecognizable from what it was even six years ago. Hell, even two years ago before they had revenue sharing. The new revenue sharing means athletes get paid directly by the universities, but it also means there is less money to keep the non-revenue generating sports afloat. Much of that money used to be directed towards these sports, and is now being directed into the pockets of the athletes.
Universities are dropping programs that cost them money to leave cash in the budget to pay these athletes. From golf, to tennis, to soccer, and even hockey at some schools, there’s no sport that doesn’t generate revenue, that is currently safe. Especially now that private equity is getting involved in some places. While Title IX will ensure women have the same opportunity as the men, there are a lot of questions about the future of many sports at a lot of these universities. With football and men’s basketball supporting most of these sports financially, the new revenue sharing means that there won’t be quite as much money left over to continue supporting these sports. They’ll get the axe if they can’t find the funds to continue them. This means it just got significantly harder to play at the NCAA Division I level, especially outside of the P4 conferences who don’t generate much revenue.
It also means that you need to develop as early as possible, while mitigating injury potential starting at a really young age. There isn’t enough time to wait until you’re 17 or 18 to start developing physically. The kids who can come in and contribute on day one, are going to be pushed to the front of the line. There are already fewer spots open for incoming freshmen due to the portal and new limits to roster sizes, and now in some sports there are even more athletes vying for these coveted roster spots that are actually available.
Get in the gym and on the field and develop strength and speed. Don’t rush to do every showcase if you’re not in the top 5% of athletes in your area, because what are you showcasing other than your shortcomings in that situation? Get dialed in with your nutrition, and especially your sleep. Make every single minute that you’re training/playing matter. This has always all been important, but now there’s even less room for error.
Put it this way: in some respects, it just got harder to make a NCAA DI roster than it is to get drafted in some sports. Last year, there were fewer NCAA DI hockey roster spots open for incoming freshman than there were picks in the NHL draft. These are wild times for sure.
I want every kid to shoot for the stars and dream enormously big, but we also need to live in the new reality that it just got exponentially harder to make it to the highest levels of collegiate play. Have DI be the goal, but realize that there are a ton of amazing athletes playing DII, DIII, ACHA, NAIA, etc.
Good luck everyone, and may the odds be ever in your favor.
