(ThyBlackMan.com) Collegiate sports are undergoing arguably its most unpredictable era ever. There are several NFL rookies leaving NFL training camps with the hopes of joining a college football team this upcoming 2026 college football season. The NCAA announced a five-year, age-based eligibility model earlier this year that starts with an athlete’s 19th birthday or the day they enroll at a school, whichever takes place first. However, there are over a dozen players from the 2022 recruiting class who were granted a temporary restraining against the NCAA last week. That temporary restraining order gave them a fifth-year of eligibility and a potential opportunity to play college football in 2026 despite many being in NFL training camps earlier this month. The Protect College Sports Act is being promoted by the NCAA to try to “solve” some of the issues in college sports with NIL, player eligibility, and the transfer portal. It’s important to also understand if there will be a Title IX impact with the Protect College Sports Act as well.
Title IX legislation was passed in 1972 to provide more opportunities for girls and women and educational institutions and to address the problem of discrimination against female students. It covers academic programs as well as athletic programs and there is an evaluation criterion to confirm whether a university or college is complying. Title IX also has had an effect on the business side of college sports because it means that most institutions needed to add women athletes at a higher rate than men to their athletic programs in order to meet certain standards. Title IX means that new women’s non-revenue sport programs have started to reallocate funding to women’s teams. Also, sports programs that had football teams would have to add about four- or five more-women’s non-revenue teams to counteract the football participants. While people argue about Title IX’s equality in terms of eliminating men’s collegiate programs, it attempts to create equal opportunities for women in sport in terms of proportionality of the women attending the college.
Title IX has been effective in securing equal opportunities for women in sport as it has had an impact in the collegiate scholarship opportunities for women in sport. It has also increased the visibility of women in sport to a higher level than it was previously. Obviously, this has led to more sponsorships and media exposure for current women’s sports leagues such as the WNBA and the LPGA. The improved media coverage of other women’s sports including softball and women’s soccer has led to female athletes including soccer star Trinity Rodman becoming role models for young female athletes growing up today.
Understandably, a lot of the focus of the Protect College Sports Act centers on major college football, which is the most significant revenue generator of college sports. There is also concern with the Protect College Sports Act regarding how Title IX would be affected. The AFL-CIO and the AFL-CIO Sports Council, which represents athlete workers across professional sports leagues, opposed the Protect College Sports Act with one of the issues being that “Title IX and the hard-fought progress for women athletes is undermined by locking in compliance standards at a level that does not sufficiently address gender discrimination.” The confluence of college sports and political meetings will continue.
Staff Writer; Mark Hines
