Nick Saban was a college football coach for 28 seasons. He was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 2025. E. Gordon Gee was a university president for 45 years at five different universities.
Saturdays once again belong to college football. Stadiums are full, rivalries have reignited, and grills are being fired up in parking lots across the country. Yet behind the tailgates and thrill of “College GameDay,” the system supporting college athletics is coming apart.
College sports has changed more in the past five years than in the previous 50. A dizzying maze of court decisions, conflicting state laws, an out-of-control transfer portal, and the rapid rise of name, image and likeness compensation (NIL) have produced a system with no national rules. The current dynamic has led to growing financial pressure on schools and uncertainty for athletes, coaches and administrators.
Between the two of us, we have spent more than a century in college athletics. One of us has led some of America’s most respected universities — Brown, Colorado, Ohio State, Vanderbilt and West Virginia. The other spent decades coaching at the highest level of college football, watching some young men become professional athletes but many more become doctors, businessmen, lawyers and public servants.
We have stood on opposite sidelines and rooted for different teams. But we are united today because we know what is at stake if college sports continue down the current path.
Sens. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Maria Cantwell (D-Washington) just accomplished something rare in D.C. They crafted comprehensive, bipartisan legislation that addresses a real crisis and built an impressively broad consensus around it — two equally mountainous tasks that reflect how Congress was intended to operate.
This week, the Senate passed the Protect College Sports Act, which establishes a national framework for the new era of college sports. Now the House must finish the job.
The central question is no longer whether college athletes should be compensated. They rightfully can, and this legislation preserves their ability to earn legitimate NIL income. The harder question now is how college sports will accommodate this new marketplace while maintaining scholarships, roster spots, nonrevenue sports, women’s programs and the educational mission that distinguishes college athletics from professional sports.
No single law can solve the problems facing college sports, but this one would create a better path forward.
For starters, it would restore order to the transfer portal. The bill would allow student-athletes to move schools once without penalty. Subsequent transfers generally require them to sit out for a year, with important exceptions — such as if there is a coaching change or the athlete is sexually abused or harassed. That matters for roster stability, but it matters more for academics. It’s already difficult to complete a college degree while playing a sport. It’s nearly impossible to get a real education when moving across as many as four schools in four years.
This legislation would also create national standards for NIL agreements and the agents who negotiate them. It would protect a student-athlete’s ability to earn unlimited legitimate NIL income, but would draw a line between those deals and compensation intended primarily to recruit or retain players. The bill would also require agents to register, cap their fees and give athletes power against bad actors.
These protections are critical for athletes navigating a marketplace that did not exist a few years ago. But at the same time, college sports is about much more than the most marketable players. It is also about the swimmer who trains before sunrise. The wrestler whose scholarship makes college possible. The gymnast, the runner, the softball player, the volleyball player and the hundreds of thousands of other student-athletes whose sports rarely make headlines but whose lives are changed by the chance to compete while earning a degree.
This legislation would safeguard those opportunities by protecting scholarships and roster thresholds so that programs are preserved rather than quietly cut. It would also prevent athletic scholarships from being revoked because of injury, athletic performance or roster-management decisions.
Additionally, it would address an economic problem college sports can no longer ignore. Athletic department deficits have grown into the millions, with 94 percent of Division I programs spending more than they generate as of 2024. The bill would give schools and conferences a voluntary option to pool media rights and negotiate them collectively, without altering conferences or traditions.
For schools that do participate, existing media contracts would be protected and revenue would be distributed according to value. This is not diluting the strong to prop up the weak. Every school would earn more than it could under the current model, and that prosperity could turn into more scholarships and more sports.
Reasonable people can disagree with the details, and debate has made this bill stronger. But there comes a moment when leadership requires moving forward.
President Donald Trump charted the way, bringing Congress and college sports leaders to the table and demanding action. More than a century ago, President Theodore Roosevelt built a similar coalition, and the crisis of that era gave rise to the NCAA.
Congress rarely gets the opportunity to strengthen a vital American institution with bipartisan legislation. This is one of those moments.
The Senate seized the opportunity. The House should do the same and send the Protect College Sports Act to President Trump’s desk without delay when it returns to session. Not for universities, and not for coaches, but for young people whose futures will be shaped by college sports.
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