President Trump this weekend noted the “current state of NIL is simply not sustainable and could cause serious damage to college athletics, and even the Olympics.” Trump during an event hosting members of the 1980 Miracle on Ice team said, “I think that it’s a disaster for college sports. I think it’s a disaster for the Olympics.” Trump: “The colleges are cutting a lot of their — they would call them sort of the ‘lesser’ sports, and they’re losing them like at numbers nobody can believe. They were really training grounds, beautiful training grounds, hard-working, wonderful young people.” Trump added, “A lot of these sports that were training so well would win gold medals because of it. Those sports don’t exist, because they’re putting all their money into football.” Trump: “Colleges cannot afford to be paying the kind of salaries that you’re hearing about” (OUTKICK, 12/13). Trump said of overhauling NIL in college sports, “Something ought to be done, and I’m willing to put the federal government behind it. And if it’s not done fast, you’re going to wipe out colleges” (USA TODAY, 12/12).

If you can’t pick one favorite, maybe it’s wise to pick two. That certainly seems to be the logical play with ESPN, as their FPI rankings give two teams an even chance to win the national title– even beyond the tenth of a percent. FPI is a slightly controversial prediction index that ties past performance into a mathematical attempt to predict future results.

Throughout the 2025 season, ESPN not only ranked the teams, but forecast their chance to win their respectives leagues, to earn a CFP berth, and even to win the CFP title. But heading into the opening week of CFP play, two teams are in exactly the same shape on top of ESPN’s ranking of most likely teams to win the national title.

FPI’s title favorites

Both Ohio State and Indiana are given a 25.9% chance to win the CFP title. Interestingly, Ohio State is slightly more likely to reach the title game, in ESPN’s reckoning (a 45% chance for the Buckeyes against a 43.1% chance for Indiana). The two are massive co-favorites, as ESPN’s third team in terms of title likelihood is Georgia, with an 11.6% shot at winning the title.

The Remainder of the CFP field

The only other teams with a better than 10% chance at the championship are Texas Tech and Oregon. The Red Raiders are rated at a 10.9% chance to win the title. The Ducks are rated with a 10.3% chance to grab the title.

No team outside of those five has a greater than 4.8% chance at winning the title– with that particular figure being linked to Ole Miss’s title chances. ESPN’s computers certainly don’t think well of the two Group of Five teams, as ESPN gives both Tulane and James Madison a 0.1% chance at winning the CFP crown. James Madison is rated with an 0.5% chance of reaching the title game, while Tulane’s chance is 0.4%.

Confusion reigns about FPI’s ratings

The math-related details behind the CFP can be complicated. 6-6 Penn State is still FPI’s No. 17 team in the nation, while 5-7 Auburn is No. 26. FPI also greatly appreciated Notre Dame, ranking the Irish third nationally. That’s comfortably ahead of the Miami and Alabama teams that grabbed the last CFP spots instead of the Irish (Miami ranks seventh and Notre Dame eighth at all. But when it comes to title chances, the FPI is all in on two teams in an exactly equal measure.

NBA legend Charles Barkley has not been shy about his thoughts on NIL and the transfer portal. During Saturday’s Kentucky vs. Indiana broadcast, he candidly discussed the landscape again.

Barkley called the game on ESPN alongside Dick Vitale, the first of two games they will work together. Vitale called for “stability” in college basketball – and college sports as a whole – because of the amount of player movement via the portal. He used Indiana as an example since new coach Darian DeVries virtually built the program from scratch.

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While Barkley acknowledged he’s in favor of athletes making money through NIL, he also called out players staying more than their four years of eligibility. In addition, he disagreed with the idea of athletes being allowed to seek better offers after every season.

“No. 1, I’m not opposed to players getting paid,” Barkley said on the broadcast. “I always want my players to get treated fairly. But I can’t remember the last time I heard the word, COVID. Some of these guys have been in college for six or seven years. If you’re in college for six or seven years, your name better be, ‘Dr. Somebody.’ You should not still be playing college basketball after six or seven years.

“But you should not have the ability to get a better offer every year. That’s not fair to any school that you are affiliated with because I can’t even do that. None of us can do that, take a better – Amazon, anybody or FOX Sports can come and say, ‘Well, we’ll give you more money and you can leave after every year.’ That’s not fair. … We’ve got to put some guardrails on these sports.”

One of the other new parts of the college basketball landscape is G-League players seeking eligibility. The NCAA has changed its approach regarding players who played in the G-League, arguing they were not professional athletes in a way the old rule said. Instead, if those players are within five years of their high school graduation, they could become eligible unless they went through the NBA Draft process or signed an NBA contract.

To Charles Barkley, that’s another area that needs fixing. He does not think former G-League players should be able to play college basketball.

“We’ve got guys playing in the G-League coming back to college sports now,” he said. “I don’t think that’s fair.”

Michigan began the week coming off a 9–3 regular season, with a Citrus Bowl matchup against No. 13 Texas on December 31 looming.

Instead, an internal investigation and a subsequent arrest that led to criminal charges left the Wolverines without head coach Sherrone Moore, forcing the athletic department into a high-stakes national search for his successor.

Moore, hired Jan. 26, 2024, and elevated from Michigan’s staff, completed two seasons as Michigan’s head coach with a record of 18-8.

Several names have circulated in the wake of Moore’s dismissal, but few have drawn more immediate attention than Arizona State head coach Kenny Dillingham, who, according to Kalshi, emerged as the market favorite with a 58% implied probability to land the Michigan job. 

This puts him well ahead of Alabama’s Kalen DeBoer (19%), Washington’s Jedd Fisch (13%), and Los Angeles Chargers defensive coordinator Jesse Minter (3%).

Dillingham’s Sun Devils rose from a 3-9 debut season to an 11-3, Big 12-championship campaign in 2024, then followed it with another solid 8-4 finish in 2025 despite losing former four-star quarterback Sam Leavitt midway through the year.

At just 34, the Arizona State alumnus has already rebuilt his alma mater into a conference champion and College Football Playoff participant, helping explain why his name has emerged as a focal point in both media coverage and prediction markets.

After that breakout 2024 season, Arizona State extended Dillingham through 2029, raising his 2025 base salary to $5.8 million as part of a $29 million agreement.

NCAA transfer portal rule changes moved the primary window to Jan. 2-16 and limited the special window after coaching changes to 15 days, beginning five days after a new hire is announced, giving Michigan a clear incentive to move quickly to retain players and recruits.

That timetable, combined with the expectation to uphold the championship standard Moore inherited, has accelerated Michigan’s process, with a decision expected within the coming weeks.

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If there had been one assistant coach most Gator fans would have liked to stick around on Jon Sumrall’s new staff, it would have been running back coach Jabbar Juluke. During his time with the Gators, the running back room was deep and felt like one of the biggest strengths of the team. It didn’t seem to matter who Juluke trotted out there; all of Florida’s running backs seemed ready and capable of rushing for 100 yards at a moment’s notice. 

But alas, Juluke didn’t stick around on Florida’s new staff, and it is his new home he just got hired at that also opens up question marks about whether Florida’s best player is going to follow him to that new home.

Jabbar Juluke hired at Texas

Texas has hired Juluke to be its running backs coach and as its associate head coach for the 2026 season. Juluke had been a target to land at Kentucky before opting for Texas.

Given how Sumrall has been assembling his staff, Gator fans should feel confident that someone notable is going to come in and fill his shoes. But given that the modern era is what it is, the immediate fear among Gator fans is whether or not running back Jadan Baugh is going to follow Juluke to Austin.

Sumrall made sure to highlight Baugh during his introductory press conference, and for good reason. After Baugh’s monster game against FSU, he ended the 2025 season as the first Florida running back since 2015 to eclipse 1,000 yards in a season. He also became the first Florida running back since Emmitt Smith to eclipse 1,000 yards in under 200 carries as an underclassman. Baugh’s 266 yards against FSU were also the 2nd most in a single game in Florida history, only behind Smith’s 316-yard performance in 1989 against New Mexico.

There is no official indication of which way Baugh might be leaning or if going to Texas has even crossed his mind. But this is the modern era of college football, where NIL and the transfer portal mean nothing can be taken for granted. 

And so, until we get an update on Baugh’s plans, Gator fans will be taking notice of their former running backs coach’s new home.

Nearly everything that head college football coaches do comes with purpose. Whether it is the lack of answering a question (with a ramble that flips to different subjects), a rant on NIL representatives or even the most mundane things like a weekly schedule, it is calculated.

That is why paying attention to what coaches say, and how it can be interpreted, is worth looking into and understanding, especially in this volatile transfer portal climate.

So when West Virginia coach Rich Rodriguez opined about the Mountaineers’ depth in the secondary and their need to add more players when the spring transfer portal window opens, there are varied ways to view it.