ESPN’s Pete Thamel got out in front of the College Football Playoff model that will not happen moving forward. Anything that has multiple autobids for certain conferences makes things a little more complicated for the average fan.

That’s what Thamel reported and could infer about where the College Football Playoff expansion is going. While there are rumblings of 14 or 16 teams, it’s likely going to be the latter.

Now how do you determine qualifiers? Well, keep it simple, stupid!

“The 4, 4, 2, 2-thing is not going to happen,” Thamel said on The College GameDay Podcast. “And certainly there’s some ways to go and things to figure out, especially the strength of schedule stuff … The point of the playoff expanding … College football is an unbelievable, regional sport that became national right around the BCS … For all its flaws, it did nationalize sport. So one of the challenges I’ve seen the sport have, trying to capture the I-95 sports fan, right? Boston, New York, Philly, you want to bring them in the same way you bring them in on the first Thursday of the NCAA tournament …

“You want to capture that casual fan, because you have the guy in Birmingham, you can’t get any more people to watch in Birmingham. And the idea of the 4, 4, 2, 2, 1, 3, if you’re sitting at the bar in Southie, trying to talk about Notre Dame’s playoff chances, it’s just like your head would explode, right?” 

Good luck trying to figure that out if you’re a casual football fan. The College Football Playoff, as Thamel describes it, is trying to appeal to those from non-traditional college football areas. If you can make it look like the NFL, you might have a chance.

“It’s not Good Will Hunting calculus, but it’s just not intuitive to a sports fan,” Thamel said. “So basically, five plus 11 is like, we’re gonna take the conference champions and the rest of the best teams, which to me, is just a lot smoother if you’re trying to explain this …

“We get so in the weeds sometimes, and we talk about these terms and we socialize them … But I just think, as this transitions to five and 11, which it appears on the trajectory to do so and probably for ‘26 but not certain, I just think for the sport in general, a clearer idea of where it’s going makes sense.”

Former Top NBA Pick Speaks Out on NIL’s Impact on Culture originally appeared on Athlon Sports.

Anthony Davis built his name in college hoops the old-fashioned way, one dominant year at Kentucky, a national title in 2012, and an unshakable bond with Big Blue Nation. But in the age of NIL and the transfer portal, the college basketball blueprint has changed. And Davis isn’t afraid to say it’s not all for the better.

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In a candid conversation with Sports Illustrated’s Patrick Andres, the NBA All-Star pulled back the curtain on how he views the current landscape. “It’s tough because obviously, they didn’t have that when I was in college,” Davis said. “It kinda takes away from the game a little bit because of, and I’m not hating, it takes away from the integrity in the sense of players are only going to certain schools because of the money.”

Those words hit home for many longtime fans and alumni who feel the spirit of college athletics is drifting. Davis’ perspective isn’t rooted in bitterness, as he acknowledges the upside. Players are earning what he once couldn’t, with top talents like Cooper Flagg and AJ Dybantsa reportedly commanding deals in the seven-figure range. It’s life-changing compensation for athletes who drive millions in revenue.

But Davis argues that with opportunity comes compromise. “Because one guy can leave the next year, transfer, it gets tough when you start talking about culture. That kind of goes out the window, in my opinion,” he added.

He’s not alone. Coaches across the NCAA have echoed similar concerns. In the 2024-25 offseason alone, over 1,900 men’s basketball players entered the transfer portal. Programs are turning into revolving doors. Culture, once cultivated over four years, now has to be microwaved in a single season.

Still, NIL isn’t going anywhere. With collectives growing and corporate sponsors investing more than ever, the system is maturing, and fast. Kentucky, Davis’ alma mater, is among the schools adapting aggressively. Their NIL infrastructure, backed by the Big Blue Nation and donor-led collectives, is among the most robust in college basketball.

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For Davis, it’s not about resisting change. It’s about accountability in shaping it. “I just hope the game doesn’t lose what made it special,” he said.

As fans, players, and schools navigate this new era, Davis’ message is clear: celebrate progress, but don’t forget the pride, loyalty and culture that once defined the college game.

Related: Kentucky Basketball Beats Cap Proposal With NIL Power Play

Related: Former Kentucky Great Has Words About NIL: “I’m Glad I Didn’t Play in That Era”

This story was originally reported by Athlon Sports on Jun 8, 2025, where it first appeared.

Paul Finebaum joined ESPN’s SportsCenter to dish on the latest regarding the NCAA House Settlement after an agreement was reached this week. He believes college athletics as we know it will go the way of the dinosaur, and that might not be the best thing to move each sport into the future.

“I couldn’t help but think back about 10 years ago, when Mark Emmert, then the President of the NCAA, essentially said college athletes will be paid over my dead body. He’s still alive, but the NCAA is dead,” Finebaum proclaimed. “It may still be in existence. We’re still having tournaments, such as the Women’s World Series and the Men’s Baseball Tournament, but the NCAA, as we know it, is gone. They literally have no jurisdiction whatsoever, other than to be tournament directors.

“This was supposed to level the playing field. Everybody pays the same into the kitty and then divides it up, but it will do anything. The big will get bigger, and the small schools will simply slip away. Other than maybe in in basketball-only conferences that can use all that money for basketball, as opposed to like, Alabama and Georgia and Ohio State, where they have to split up $20.5 million.”

While sports like football would likely be able to survive a nuclear blast, Finebaum thinks some rising competitions, like softball and women’s sports as a whole, are facing an uphill battle. The ESPN analyst was blunt in his assessment, worrying about what comes next.

“It will look a little bit like the NCAA basketball tournament this year, where the mid-majors, where we had all those great upsets, the Butlers of the past and so many incredible stories, the Valpos — they’re going to be gone. It’s going to be the big schools on top, the rest of college athletics is going to suffer,” Finebaum said, regarding what college athletics will look like over the next decade.

“… The real casualty of all this, I believe, is going to be the one part of college athletics that has grown so much. We watched the Women’s World Series last night, a million dollar pitcher, by the way, for Texas Tech. Women’s sports, I think, are going to suffer from this. If you’re one of these Ohio States or Alabamas, and you’re dividing up $20.5 million, you know where most of it’s going, it’s going to football. That’s really a major casualty.

“… College Athletics did this to themselves. They’re not really suffering for it, because it’s a billion dollar industry, but it’s going to be very uneven in the future. I think, at some point, fans are going to start tuning out. There’s such an existential threat to what we grew up loving, and we still do. It’s not going to be the same anymore.”

All told, we’ll have to wait and see if Paul Finebaum doom-and-gloom prediction comes true. Regardless, college athletics as a whole is changing right before our eyes, and it’s anyone’s guess as to what the future holds.

BLOOMINGTON — Indiana basketball coach Darian DeVries basically had to start from scratch when putting together his roster for the 2025-26 season.

Schools across the United States can now directly pay college athletes under a landmark settlement approved by a federal judge on Friday, June 6. The agreement, valued at $2.8 billion, established a 10-year revenue-sharing model in college sports, enabling athletic departments to distribute approximately $20.5 million in name, image and likeness (NIL) revenue to athletes during the 2025-26 season.

Additionally, the NCAA will pay nearly $2.8 billion in damages to Division I athletes who were previously prohibited from signing NIL deals, with compensation dating back to 2016. U.S. District Judge Claudia Wilken initially declined to approve the settlement due to concerns over scholarship limits, which would have caused thousands of athletes to lose spots on Division I teams.

After revisions, implementation of these limits may now be delayed for several years, allowing schools more time to adapt. The changes will also allow colleges to offer more full or partial athletic scholarships, reshaping the financial and competitive aspects of college sports.

Participation in the revenue-sharing model is voluntary, and institutions that choose to take part are not required to pay the full $20.5 million. The Ivy League, for example, opted out of the settlement, choosing to continue its longstanding amateurism rules for student athletes. The league recently won an antitrust lawsuit upholding its policy against offering athletic scholarships.

The settlement builds on legal challenges that have reshaped NCAA regulations in recent years. In June 2021, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ruled against the NCAA in a landmark decision, asserting that college athletics should be treated more as a commercial enterprise than as an education-focused activity. This ruling triggered a wave of lawsuits and scrutiny that have greatly disrupted the collegiate sports landscape.

NCAA President Charlie Baker expressed optimism about the settlement, calling it a pivotal moment for college athletics.

“Approving the agreement reached by the NCAA, the defendant conferences and student-athletes in the settlement opens a pathway to begin stabilizing college sports,” Baker said. “This new framework that enables schools to provide direct financial benefits to student-athletes and establishes clear and specific rules to regulate third-party NIL agreements marks a huge step forward for college sports.”

The agreement signals a transformative shift in the treatment of college athletes, challenging traditional notions of amateurism while advancing their financial rights. By allowing direct payments to athletes, the settlement introduces a new era in which student-athletes are recognized as contributors to a lucrative entertainment industry, with wide-ranging implications for recruitment practices, competitive balance and the prioritization of sports programs at higher education institutions.