NCAA will be done in 5 years.

Football and basketball have become minor leagues for the NFL and NBA.

I don't like the direction is going. I've had numerous athletes I coach (including my daughter) get D1 scholarships for running. But, I would like to see all college sports at every level go the D3 model.

Each of those athletes I coached would have gotten money for their academics if they had gone D3.

I did my time in the NCAA and I'm happy I did. That said, I want the US to adopt more of a club model like the rest of the world. Conflating education and top-level athletics is just silly. Especially when you consider that the actual breadwinners, the athletes that make sports viable for a school, the football and basketball teams at big universities, are almost all not there for the education.

Very interesting to see where this goes. Even if all sports outside of football/ basketball went to the true amateur D3 model, the NCAA organization is still necessary to coordinate rules, playoffs etc.

There is huge value with alumni loyalty and donations linked to football and basketball being tied to the school. I go once every couple of years to Alabama for a game weekend, with golf, football, restaurants all packed into a tight schedule. My hosts are just a tiny cog in the wheel, but all the big donors are basically doing this every game weekend. If suddenly the football became a minor league separate from the college, these donors and all the pageantry around going back to campus would dry up.

Even at modest athletic schools like Dartmouth, Princeton, Williams,Amherst etc, the football weekend is still the core of alumni activity. (This is also true for basketball and hockey)

My guess is there is eventually a separation from the ncaa of the top 64ish schools at the top into a big money league including all sports. The remaining 200 d1 schools will just stay in NCAA as a watered down d1.

I like NCAA football, but the number of transfers that now occur make it hard to even recall who is on the teams I'm rooting for. I'm finding it less interesting than a few years ago.

My friend was telling me about how some of the big name donors at these schools might be given the illusion that they can call plays and have real influence in the sport.

Like, a 75 year old retiree alumnus with too much money calls some special phone number during the big game. "Hello, Alabama football? Yes, tell DeBoer that we need a good one. I'm thinking some play action to the tailback and a quick toss to the tightend." "Yes Mr. Moneybags, I will pass that along for you!"

I still really enjoyed this NCAA football season. And I thought the top teams were pretty stable. Generally it's the unhappy athletes who are jumping around, and they're unhappy because they're not starting or their team was bad.

It’s not just the Tennessee NIL case. The big two conferences are trying to break away and take all of the revenue. The NCAA has about 6-7 cases coming against them in the next few year that will basically eliminate any power that they have.

This shift was always coming. Transfer portal, recruiting rules shifting younger, NIL money, cost of attendance. All have happened in less than ten years. COVID poured gasoline on the fire with the bonus eligibility.

It was a good run. The real decision will be if schools was to ax athletic completely. I don’t think they will. D2 exists, D3, NAIA. It’s marketing for the school, alumni engagement, and for smaller schools it drives enrollment

I enjoyed it as well, but have similar concerns to Nancy B. I ran for a P5 school and go back to many football and basketball games, but I agree with her that the jumping around is getting a bit absurd. Maybe it will cool off now that the COVID year is phasing out, but I fear we've seen the end of guys/girls heading to a program and blossoming within that program. I mean, even track is looking like it may go that way. Look at Oregon!

Time will tell, but there are more than enough jock sniffers out there who will gladly pay for some kid to come to their school of choice for a year. It is an ego thing and it shouldn't be allowed. I am not against the spirit of NIL - I used to think I was - but I don't like the way it seems to have festered into dark money territory. It is too much. I don't know how you control it. I am fine with Nike sponsoring Parker V. or Lulu sponsoring that LSU gymnast, but under that level it seems rife for abuse.

So many NCAA track & field athletes could have won medals at world indoors.

Collegiate athletes deserve the benefits pros get when they have pro abilities.

it’s about time though. The last school I worked at had more “athletic directors” than sports. We had a team of Sports Info directors that didn’t keep our roster/ website updated and only published the write ups that coaches sent them. All made more money than most of the Olympic coaches. There is so so much bloat in athletic departments.

Lol this too. Bureaucracy is inevitable. I work in a corporate bureacracy where I have to sign 10 papers just to pick my nose. BUT, our athletics directors were some of the worst bureaucrats I've ever had the displeasure of knowing and I know it's not unique to my institution.

I get more upset about the NCAA maintaining the illusion that all student-athletes are valued and equal. For all of their hand wringing about opportunity, football and basketball athletes are living in another universe that is lucrative beyond imagination.

I know about a half dozen athletes that graduated from my high school team to Power 5 track and XC programs. They all have similar stories about being an Olympic sports athlete vs. football/basketball. The track runners are getting partial athletic aid, a generous gear allocation, decent food, and good medical care. Like most college students, they are using savings from a summer job or their allowance from parents to buy gas, grab pizza off-campus, or pay their share of the rent for an off-campus apartment or house. Pretty typical college student lifestyles. These kids come from upper middle-class homes and two are from high earning families.

Then there are football and basketball athletes. Most allegedly come from hard scrabble, disadvantaged backgrounds. Many went to terrible schools in bad neighborhoods and this sport provides a ticket to better things. Despite the fact that they get a full ride for playing their sport, one would think that they would also be struggling a bit to pay for a date, see a movie, or escape the dorms.

Nope! The reserved football players parking lot is filled with European luxury cars, exotic sports cars, and loaded pickups that cost north of $100K. The basketball players all wear at least $20K worth of watches and jewelry at any given time. Loads of high-end tattoo work on display. Designer clothing, rare vintage sneakers, and jewel encrusted iPhone cases are the norm. Quite a few have never seen what a college dorm looks like since they moved into fancy condos, lofts, and five-bedroom homes in gated communities after arriving for their first pre-season camp. Even the third string scrubs are living a pro lifestyle. They are almost never spotted in the library, the student union, or a classroom. Maybe they get instruction at the (Insert Donor Name Here) Athletics Center for Academic Excellence?

I understand capitalism and that donor money flows to the revenue producing sports. If the ball sports guys get some extra Jordans, a conference championship ring, a prime rib buffet every Friday night, or a nice tailored suit for travel, that's fine. But it stinks of corruption and deviates from the mission of the university when 18-year-old ball athletes somehow have Porsches, Rolexes, and a high-rise penthouse while XC athletes are working part-time jobs during the season to afford streaming services or to grab a coffee on the way to class.

I'm kind of with you here but while this is a really interesting topic I think it's just too soon to tell where the pieces will fall. There are over 1,000 schools in the NCAA across all three divisions. The discontent with the NCAA now seems to come from forty to sixty or so schools that play really big time football. And their discontent seems mostly about football and maybe a bit about basketball but in the latter case probably not serious enough to break away. Right now if they broke away no one seems to know what football would look like either for them or for the rest of the NCAA members and there are big questions associated with a breakaway.

I suppose the NCAA could disappear. Colleges were sponsoring athletic teams before the NCAA existed. But the creation of the NCAA was because those schools wanted to put some sort of structure into college sports. Why would they now decide they're better off having no organizational structure just because the big time football schools are no longer part of that organization? Maybe they will decide that but right now I don't see why but again. it's too soon to tell.

Those 40-60 schools make all of the money to fund the rest of the NCAA.

Every regional, ncaa meet loses money for every sport outside of football and basketball ( even then most lose money) those schools are breaking away and taking then billions in TV money with them

This was very much in-line with my experience, except when I was in college there was no NIL deals so it was all under-the-table and illegal, and it was more concentrated in the better athletes (although benchwarmers were getting more than we did). Also should mention their access to cocaine, strippers, high quality alcohol, and other drugs was on another level. Not sure that was necessarily supplied by someone associated with the university (even under-the-table) but it was definitely there. The cars and housing is spot-on though, no idea where the money really came from or how it was justified but every good football and basketball athlete lived off-campus in a nice apartment and drove a luxury or sports car.

Yes, those schools make most of the money the NCAA brings in now. What happens if they're gone is what we don't know. Most NCAA schools do not have athletic departments that turn a profit yet they sponsor multiple athletic teams. Why would those schools decide they don't need or want the NCAA or something like it once the big money makers are gone?

Yes, this is exactly correct. The NCAA really sees the writing on the wall now with the BIG10 and SEC and this Tn case. They are about to have zero power. And when nobody likes you in the first place, good luck staying afloat.

I could see the NCAA existing even without the 60 money-makers. The NAIA exists afterall.

I love this topic, so much change is coming to colleges soon. Shake ups all over the place.

The enrollment cliff and pricing out students is going to be a major issue. High school graduates are expected to peak next year then decline for a long long time. The Boomers kids are all now past college age and the times of unlimited enrollment growth are over.

I hope sports stick around but with no revenue and less students there are going to be less opportunities