{"id":125115,"date":"2025-09-01T15:12:09","date_gmt":"2025-09-01T15:12:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/125115\/"},"modified":"2025-09-01T15:12:09","modified_gmt":"2025-09-01T15:12:09","slug":"what-will-college-football-look-like-in-10-years-massive-changes-loom","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/125115\/","title":{"rendered":"What will college football look like in 10 years? Massive changes loom"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ohio State<\/a> and Florida State<\/a> got into the win column. Texas<\/a> and Alabama<\/a> did not. The first big weekend of major college football is in the books, and now, players and athletic departments can settle into a new, once-unthinkable era in which schools pay athletes and a team\u2019s ultimate goal isn\u2019t a bowl game, but the playoff.<\/p>\n

Nobody should get too comfortable. <\/p>\n

In just seven years, the main funding source of all this change \u2014 a menu of media deals highlighted by ESPN\u2019s $7.8 billion contract<\/a> to televise the College Football Playoff \u2014 will either be renegotiated or blown up amid even more change. Whatever happens, another round of jockeying will almost certainly include a massive influx of even more cash. <\/p>\n

What could stem from that is any or all of the following: the introduction of private equity, an NFL-style super league with a bigger playoff, a greater gap between haves and have-nots in college sports, and, of course, increased payouts for players.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it will still be called college sports, but I think it\u2019s going to look completely different in the next five, 10, 15 years,\u201d said Paia LaPalombara, a partner at the Church, Church, Hittle and Antrim law firm who specializes on college sports deals and previously worked at the NCAA and in the Ohio State athletic department.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

The trophy is displayed during media day ahead of the national championship NCAA College Football Playoff game between Washington and Michigan Saturday, Jan. 6, 2024, in Houston. (AP Photo\/Godofredo A. Vasquez, File)<\/p>\n

The trophy is displayed during media day ahead of the national championship NCAA College Football Playoff game between Washington and Michigan Saturday, Jan. 6, 2024, in Houston. (AP Photo\/Godofredo A. Vasquez, File)<\/p>\n

Read More<\/p>\n

CFP is one part of a bigger TV rights puzzle<\/p>\n

Most of the billions ESPN pays to televise the newly expanded 12-team playoff goes directly to the conferences, with the SEC and Big Ten getting the most money starting in 2026 and the ACC, Big 12 and Notre Dame collecting multiple millions. <\/p>\n

All those conferences also have their own media-rights deals \u2014 the SEC and Big Ten are worth $1 billion or more \u2014 and when those deals expire, sports media experts who see live sports as maybe the most valuable property in TV and streaming believe the value will increase dramatically.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not just the playoffs, it\u2019s the top 50 schools,\u201d said sports marketing expert Joe Favorito. \u201cAre they worth \u20184X\u2019 what they\u2019re worth now for their rights? They could be. It\u2019s going to be a reimagining of it all.\u201d<\/p>\n

All of this bodes well for college athletes, whose portion of the revenue sharing is tied to the amount their schools bring in for the next 10 years under terms of the $2.8 billion NCAA antitrust settlement<\/a> that allows their schools to share revenue \u2014 to pay them \u2014 directly as of July 1.<\/p>\n

Could private equity make a difference?<\/p>\n

Under terms of the settlement, schools are allowed to pay players up to 22% of revenue from certain categories such as media rights, ticket sales and sponsorship. For the next school year, that means a school can spent up to $20.5 million to keep athletes happy alongside whatever third-party NIL deals are being struck. But that\u2019s hardly their only expense as the House settlement reduced the incoming revenue for schools and conferences over the next decade. The settlement also increased the number of those expensive scholarships schools can give out across all sports they sponsor. <\/p>\n

Can private funding be a solution to what some see as a cash crunch for athletic departments eager to lure and retain top talent and still pay a growing number of bills?<\/p>\n

\u201cThe thing about private equity is, we\u2019re owned by the state of Ohio and the state of Ohio is not for sale,\u201d Buckeyes athletic director Ross Bjork said. \u201cPrivate equity has to buy something. I see these reports about how Ohio State is valued by Forbes at $2.3 billion. But nobody could buy 10% of that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Not that some aren\u2019t trying to make this work. Florida State and the Big 12 Conference are among those who have explored deals with private equity firms, though neither reached agreements. Undoubtedly, they won\u2019t be the last to try. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere are definitely ways to do it,\u201d said Dave Checketts, the former pro sports executive who is in the private equity space. \u201cI know a public school right now that\u2019s talking about selling basically half of what I\u2019d call their athletics-entertainment business. That means the revenue they get from football, basketball and, in this case, they have a concert business. You come up with a number, then multiply that by five years of revenue and sell half of it to private equity.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"Syracuse<\/p>\n

Syracuse running back Yasin Willis (6) leaps over the line for a touchdown against Tennessee during the second half of an NCAA college football game, Saturday, Aug. 30, 2025, in Atlanta. (AP Photo\/Mike Stewart)<\/p>\n

Syracuse running back Yasin Willis (6) leaps over the line for a touchdown against Tennessee during the second half of an NCAA college football game, Saturday, Aug. 30, 2025, in Atlanta. (AP Photo\/Mike Stewart)<\/p>\n

Read More<\/p>\n

Would a super league drive revenue? <\/p>\n

Another way private equity might get into the game is through the idea of a super league.<\/a><\/p>\n

Two separate investors backed concepts called \u201cCollege Sports Tomorrow\u201d and \u201cProject Rudy,\u201d looking for ways to take 70 or more teams at the top of college football and combine them into an NFL-style league with huge payouts. <\/p>\n

Neither commissioner from the two biggest conferences likes the idea. <\/p>\n

\u201cI have yet to see a single thing in any plan that contains things that we couldn\u2019t do ourselves,\u201d Big Ten Commissioner Tony Petitti said last year, reflecting the reality that around 80% of Power Four conference schedules are either league games or games against other Power Four teams.<\/p>\n

\u201cProject Rudy\u201d investors were floating a reported $9 billion investment with a chance to drive a $15 billion increase in media revenue over 12 yearrs, according to Yahoo! Sports. <\/p>\n

Such a move could involve antitrust issues \u2014 the combining of the big conference media rights is against the law \u2014 and might hasten a complete breakup of the NCAA as we know it, significant because the smaller schools play an outsize role in the success of March Madness. <\/p>\n

Is more realignment to come?<\/p>\n

Absent a super league, the Big Ten and SEC figure to dictate what the playoff looks like, both for the remainder of the current contract and the next one. <\/p>\n

What\u2019s hard to know is whether they will keep vacuuming up more teams to expand the size of their own footprints. <\/p>\n

After Florida State and Clemson threatened to possibly depart the ACC, the league tried to cement its future by making a deal with them that restructures its media rights deal to give more money to teams<\/a> that draw more viewers. <\/p>\n

The Big 12 is at 16 teams. It\u2019s hard to demolish that, even if only five have roots dating to the start of a once-Midwestern conference that now stretches across four time zones. <\/p>\n

The Pac-12 was once part of the Power Five but nearly disintegrated and looks more like a Group of Five league as currently constructed, soon to be filled<\/a> with schools that are still not as big as the big boys.<\/p>\n

Jeffrey Kessler, a lead attorney for players in the House settlement, said change remains inevitable in college sports, with the players set to benefit the most.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe reality is that the biggest revenue schools are in a different parameter as the schools with lower revenue,\u201d he said. \u201cThere\u2019s been a continuous movement of those schools, frankly, getting more independent decision-making and more control over their own destiny. There\u2019s no reason to think that won\u2019t continue. But I also don\u2019t see them leaving the NCAA.\u201d<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

Get poll alerts and updates on the AP Top 25 throughout the season. Sign up here<\/a>. AP college football: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/ap-top-25-college-football-poll<\/a> and https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/college-football<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ohio State and Florida State got into the win column. Texas and Alabama did not. The first big…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":125116,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[67],"tags":[2724,44930,9594,1771,1607,2662,79964,8940,399,79963,79965,9643,398,396,397,6163,99,9596],"class_list":["post-125115","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ncaa-football","tag-associated-press","tag-big-12-conference","tag-big-ten-conference","tag-clemson-tigers","tag-college-football","tag-college-sports","tag-dave-checketts","tag-florida-state-seminoles","tag-football","tag-jeffrey-kessler","tag-joe-favorito","tag-national-football-league","tag-ncaa","tag-ncaa-football","tag-ncaafootball","tag-southeastern-conference","tag-sports","tag-tony-petitti"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125115","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=125115"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125115\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/125116"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=125115"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=125115"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=125115"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}