Texas, with Heisman Trophy candidate Arch Manning set to take over as starting quarterback, is the preseason pick to win the SEC championship.

The Longhorns received 96 of the 204 votes cast from media members covering the SEC media days this week to be crowned SEC champion on Dec. 6 in Atlanta at Mercedes-Benz Stadium. Georgia, with 44 votes, received the second-most votes.

If that scenario plays out, it would mean a rematch of the 2024 SEC Championship Game, which Georgia won in an overtime thriller. The SEC title game pits the two teams with the best regular-season conference record against one another.

Alabama was third with 29 votes, while LSU got 20. South Carolina was next with five, while Oklahoma received three and Vanderbilt and Florida each got two votes. Tennessee, Ole Miss and Auburn each received one vote.

Since 1992, only 10 times has the predicted champion in the preseason poll gone on to win the SEC championship.

The 2024 SEC title game averaged 16.6 million viewers, the fourth-largest audience on record for the game. The OT win for Georgia, which peaked with 19.7 million viewers, delivered the largest audience of the college football season.

Reporting by The Associated Press.

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Not many stars are shining brighter in college football these days than Ryan Williams. Nicknamed “Hollywood”, Williams burst onto the scene as a 17-year-old true freshman in 2024. He had one of the biggest plays of the season when he caught the eventual game-winning touchdown to lead the Crimson Tide to a win over Georgia in September.

Last season was just the beginning for Williams, and he was just scratching the surface of where his immense talent will eventually lead him.

His talent and stardom are being recognized outside of Tuscaloosa. Williams was one of the two cover athletes for College Football 26, joining fellow star sophomore WR Jeremiah Smith of Ohio State. Now, Williams has inked a major NIL deal with the biggest brand in sports.

Ryan Williams signs an NIL deal with Nike

Nike announced the deal on Friday morning:

Via a press release from Nike, Williams said: “Since I can remember, Nike has always been the best fit on and off the field. Family has always been a huge part of who I am. When I had the opportunity to join the Nike family, I knew I had to just do it.”

Details of the deal have yet to be made public, but this is a major, and legitimate, NIL deal for Williams. Per Pete Nakos, he becomes just the second college football player to sign an NIL deal with Nike, joining former Colorado QB Shedeur Sanders, who signed with Nike last August before his final season in Boulder.

This deal is exactly what NIL is supposed to be in college sports. This is Williams capitalizing on his and Alabama’s brand, not just money being funneled to him through a collective. This is one of the first legitimate NIL deals to be publicized since the groundbreaking House vs. NCAA settlement, which legalized revenue-sharing and is expected to bring major changes to NIL and the end of booster-backed collectives.

Williams is gearing up for his sophomore season in Tuscaloosa, and Tide head coach Kalen DeBoer was highly complimentary of his star WR at SEC Media Days, praising his work ethic this offseason.

New OC Ryan Grubb will look to find creative ways to get the ball in the hands of Williams. The sophomore WR will have more help alongside him this season, with an impressive core of receivers joining him to prevent too much bracket coverage. Germie Bernard is back, and Miami (FL) transfer Isaiah Horton gives Alabama a legitimate No. 3 option on the outside, which the team sorely lacked a season ago.

The depth behind that trio is impressive, too, with young WRs like Rico Scott and Lotzeir Brooks plenty good enough to find playing time.

Williams should be in store for an even bigger year two.

While the focus has been on the 2026 class and trying to stay competitive with the way NIL has changed everything, that doesn’t mean Ohio State football hasn’t lost focus on 2027. Ryan Day and Co. have been working overtime in sending out new offers.

One top target for ’27 is no question signal-caller Teddy Jarrard, who is ranked the No. 2 quarterback in the country for his class. On Thursday, Jarrard revealed his Top 5 and the Buckeyes made the list. That’s the good news. The bad news here, however, is that Notre Dame is considered the overwhelming favorite to eventually land him.

Ohio State is a finalist for 4-star QB Teddy Jarrard but Notre Dame is the favorite

Marcus Freeman is doing an unreal job recruiting wise right now, which is not good for the Buckeyes. However, as of this writing, the elite QB is yet to shut down his recruitment and nothing is set in stone. Could Ohio State catch up and pass ND here? It’s possible.

In addition to Ohio State and Notre Dame, Jarrard also included Penn State, Georgia and Michigan among his finalists. While Jarrard is a top target for Ohio State, keep in mind that 2027 QB Brady Edmunds has been committed to Ohio State since December.

He gave the Buckeyes an incredibly early verbal, which can also be said about 5-star wideout Jamier Brown, who is on board as well for the 2027 group with Edmunds. Is Day looking at taking two QBs for next year’s class? It sure looks that way.

Again, no decision has been made by Jarrard other than the fact that he’s now down to five programs. Even though Notre Dame is the favorite, if Day wants him bad enough, he can take things to the next level in showing Jarrard he’s a priority – getting him on campus this fall for a game is a no-brainer move. Will Jarrard end up playing his college ball in Columbus? It’s hard to say, but everyone knows better than to count Day out.

Andrew Harrison is certainly a hero at Kentucky after leading them to back-to-back Final Four appearances and a National Championship appearance in 2014, but that was all 10 years ago, and he never won a title.

When sitting down with current Kentucky players for interviews, Harrison made quite the claim that many other college football experts would disagree with: Kentucky has the best basketball culture and is the best blue blood program in the country.

Yes, Harrison is making that claim knowing the type of programs that the Duke Blue Devils and, of course, the North Carolina Tar Heels have. He even made an emphasis on saying they are certainly better than both of those blue blood programs.

“I don’t care what anybody says about North Carolina, Duke — it’s not like this,” Harrison said. “It’s not like this, I’m telling you.”

That is certainly a crazy claim to make, and especially as emphatically as he made it. When college basketball greats are talked about, UNC and Duke are always the first two programs to come out of someone’s mouth. First of all, that rivalry is the end all be all rivalry in college basketball, but also both programs had two of the most legendary coaches to ever coach the game.

Harrison said his reasoning behind it all was that if you win a championship with Kentucky, you can go back to campus in 50 years and everyone will still recognize you. The irony in that statement is that while Harrison led the Wildcats to a title game, he didn’t actually win it, so he can’t be talking about himself by saying that.

Also, that is trying to say that the star UNC and Duke players wouldn’t be recognized. Heck, even players who didn’t win a championship are still remembered in Chapel Hill and Durham. Harrison is just trying to elevate the Kentucky program; he isn’t really doing it in the best manner.

The Wildcats have just one championship in this century, back in 2012, when both UNC and Duke have each won three since the turn of the century. So nice try, Harrison, but the logic just isn’t backing you up here.

Questions about whether President Donald Trump will issue an executive order to address name, image and likeness standards in college sports after media reports surfaced he was working on one earlier this week.

Following a 2021 Supreme Court ruling, student athletes have been allowed to profit from their publicity with sponsorship deals. The change has drastically changed the landscape of collegiate sports, and college sports leaders have repeatedly met with lawmakers to push for federal standards and guidelines.

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CBS News reported on July 15 that Trump was planning to sign an executive order in the following days to establish those standards. Front Office Sports and Yahoo! Sports also reported the order was in the works.

This is not the first time reports have surfaced on Trump’s plans to address NIL, and the U.S. House of Representatives is working on legislation known as the SCORE Act. The White House did not comment on the media reports, and USA TODAY Sports reported college leaders did not have knowledge of an imminent order.

But whatever new laws or regulations come into fruition on NIL for student athletes, the consequences could hit close to home for the president. Trump’s eldest granddaughter, Kai Trump, is a young golf star and future college athlete with her own NIL deals. Here is what to know:

More: College sports leaders unaware of Donald Trump’s plan for executive order addressing NIL

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What is NIL?

The acronym stands for name, image and likeness. NIL deals protect student athletes’ rights to earn money from their publicity and sometimes includes a big-name brand endorsement, like Kai Trump’s.

Until a historic 2021 Supreme Court decision that led to an NCAA rule change, the NCAA didn’t allow student-athletes to profit from their name, image and likeness.

An array of state laws have been passed to regulate it, but college sports leaders have pushed for federal intervention.

Who is Trump’s granddaughter, Kai Trump?

Kai Trump, 18, is President Trump’s eldest granddaughter, the daughter of Donald Trump Jr. and ex-wife Vanessa Trump.

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Kai Trump made her political debut at the Republican National Convention ahead of the 2024 election, talking up the human side to her grandfather, who she said calls her to check in on her golf game.

She is a rising senior at The Benjamin School in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida. She has committed to playing golf at the University of Miami after graduating.

Does Kai Trump have a NIL deal?

Yes, she has a few brand partnerships.

On July 15, Kai announced a new partnership with Accelerator Active Energy. In February, Kai announced her first lucrative endorsement deal with big-name golf equipment company TaylorMade.

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On3, a website that rates high school and college athletes, valued her name, image and likeness (NIL) at more than $1.2 million. The valuation makes her No. 1 in women’s high school golf and No. 98 among high school and college athletes’ valuation, according to On3.

Her recent announcement with Accelerator energy drinks, where Travis Kelce is also a brand ambassador, was presidential-themed in a nod to her grandfather. She later went on “Fox & Friends” to announce the new deal.

“He really just taught me to keep on fighting and keep on practicing and whatnot,” Kai said in the interview, according to Golfweek. “I’ve loved playing golf with him my whole life. It’s the reason that we share a special bond together.”

Contributing: Tom Schad, Matt Hayes, Jennifer Sangalang, Eric J. Wallace, USA TODAY

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Kinsey Crowley is the Trump Connect reporter for the USA TODAY Network. Reach her at kcrowley@gannett.com. Follow her on X and TikTok @kinseycrowley or Bluesky at @kinseycrowley.bsky.social.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Who is Kai Trump? POTUS granddaughter gets NIL deal amid fed lawmaking