Big changes are coming to college sports. A judge has approved the NCAA’s “House settlement,” allowing schools to start paying athletes directly for the first time.

Starting July 1st, schools can share up to $20.5 million a year with players, mainly in football and men’s basketball. That number could grow each year.

The NCAA and power conferences (SEC, Big Ten, Big 12, ACC) also agreed to pay nearly $2.8 billion to athletes who played between 2016 and 2024 for past lost earnings from name, image, and likeness (NIL) opportunities.

To make sure the money is handled fairly, a new group called the College Sports Commission will oversee all payments and rules. It’s separate from the NCAA and will enforce new limits, like a salary cap and roster sizes.

This means that any new agreement between an athlete and a third party — such as a business, brand, booster, or collective — must be reviewed and approved by the Deloitte-managed NIL clearinghouse.

Known as “NIL Go,” this clearinghouse will evaluate all NIL deals worth over $600 to ensure they meet fair market value standards. Deals that don’t meet these standards may be rejected, and athletes who accept unapproved offers could risk losing their eligibility.

This marks a major shift from the past when athletes were not paid directly and NIL rules were loosely enforced.

Lawmakers are now working on a federal law to protect the NCAA and schools from future lawsuits as a result of the settlement.

A new era of college sports is finally here.

• The House vs. NCAA settlement allows schools to share revenue with athletes and provides damages for past NIL inequities.
• Alabama athletics will operate under a salary cap, starting at over $20 million annually, with most going to football and men’s basketball.
• Athletes can still pursue NIL deals, but a new commission will increase oversight and enforcement.
• Roster limits will be implemented, but current athletes won’t be immediately affected.

Change has officially come for collegiate athletics.

The post NCAA football news: Gamers can help their team earn NIL money on College Football 26 appeared first on ClutchPoints.

Already, EA Sports College Football 26 is generating plenty of buzz a month before release. Speculation about Bill Belichick’s appearance is certainly palpable.

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In addition, players will be paid $ 1,500 for appearing in the game, an increase from $600 in the previous year’s game. Those same players could receive NIL money thanks to the gamers themselves, per Darren Rovell of CLLCT media.

Schools featured in the game could get paid based on how frequently gamers play with their team—a radically innovative approach in the era of NIL for college athletes.

Athletes will be able to showcase their talents broadly through the game. The players’ exposure could land them sponsorship deals as well as grow their fan bases.

Furthermore, the players will have their name, image, and likeness on full display throughout the game. Before the NIL era, gamers would solely have to come up with names for players.

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The players also have the option to opt in or opt out of this deal, allowing them to maintain control over how they utilize their NIL. From a gaming perspective, this sparks a significant shift from the way things were prior to NIL.

The evolution of gaming and NIL 

Before the NIL era, college athletes were barred from earning money from their name, image, and likeness. That included appearances on EA Sports games.

The straw that broke the camel’s back was the historic O’Bannon vs. NCAA case. In 2009, former UCLA basketball player Ed O’Bannon filed a lawsuit against the NCAA

He claimed its amateurism rules illegally prevented college athletes from being compensated for their name, image, and likeness.  This derived after seeing his image featured on EA Sports’ NCAA Basketball 09 without his consent, nor did he receive any compensation.

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The outcome resulted in schools being allowed to offer athletic scholarships covering full cost of attendance. In addition, the case ruled that schools could place up to $5,000 into a trust for each athlete to use their NIL.

Thus paving the way for where we are now regarding video games.

Related: Former MLB exec to be new head of College Sports Commission

Related: Judge approves NCAA House Settlement allowing schools to pay players

The revenue-sharing era of college sports has finally arrived. How will Louisville and Kentucky respond?

About five years after its filing, the seminal House v. NCAA lawsuit has reached a resolution. Its settlement received final approval from Judge Claudia Wilken Friday.

When EA Sports College Football 26 comes out in July, schools will be compensated in a new way. Payouts will be determined by the amount of time users play as teams in the video game, cllct’s Matt Liberman reported.

Documents obtained by cllct show a new structure for royalties from the video game, which made its return last year. CLC Learfield will play a central role in the process, according to the documents, and it’s a shift from last year when the company said it couldn’t historically tie sales of the game to specific schools.

The royalty process is also a change from last year’s tier system. Schools were placed into one of four tiers based on the previous 10 years of final AP poll results, and that determined the revenue distribution. Now, it appears to be based on the time users spend playing as a school.

In a sample scenario from cllct, the total royalties in a university pool would be $5 million with 700 million games played. If users play 7 million games as School A, the school’s allocation would be 1%. Therefore, School A would receive $50,000.

“For each CFB product released by EA SPORTS, we (CLC Learfield) will provide a percentage for each institution based on the games played for that institution as a percentage of the total games played across all institutions,” a document says. “This percentage of games played will become the final allocation percentage for each school that will be applied to the total gross royalties for all institutions received.”

EA Sports College Football 26 will look to build on the success of College Football 25, which became the largest new console game launch in North America in 2024. EA also announced the video game had seen 6.5 million unique players to date. Quick math shows EA brought in more than $400 million in sales from the game.

This year’s standard edition cover will also feature two sophomore wide receivers – Ohio State’s Jeremiah Smith and Alabama’s Ryan Williams. Additionally, the deluxe addition features a mix of current college football stars, head coaches and legends, as well as fans in the background.

EA Sports also released a trailer May 29, providing an inside look at gameplay. It also showed new features such as “Enter Sandman” by Metallica before a Virginia Tech game, as well as some of the coaches in the game, such as Ohio State’s Ryan Day and Texas’ Steve Sarkisian.