(KBTX) – House Bill 126- which amends the previous name, image, and likeness (NIL) compensation legislation in Texas- was signed into law by Gov. Greg Abbott on Thursday.

The law goes into effect immediately, as the bill received two-thirds majority vote in both chambers of the Texas legislature.

This bill, authored by Rep. Carl Tepper (R-District 84) widens existing NIL legislation so that athletes can be paid NIL compensation directly from their universities, while they are performing team-sanctioned events or to be used as influence for enrollment at a school. It also contains a clause allowing new NCAA rules or court orders to supersede the state law, circumventing the need to update NIL law every two years.

“It’s more like satisfying that you might have had a small hand in saving college football in Texas,” Tepper told KBTX last week. “Of course, it’s something we had to do and it’s something that we worked with a lot of the institutions to get done, including their legal counsel.”

With a settlement waiting for approval in the House v. NCAA antitrust case in the coming weeks, the state was in need of the new language in the bill to comply. As it currently reads, the House settlement provides $2.6 billion in back payments for athletes who missed out on NIL from 2016 to the legalization of the payments in 2021. More important to this bill, the settlement allows universities to share revenue for the use of the athletes’ NIL in television broadcasts of games, among other things, which violates the previous law in the state.

Universities opting into the settlement are expected to enter into contracts with individual athletes with compensation varying by sport and position. Under the new law and the settlement, these contracts can be used as recruiting enticements for perspective athletes.

Legal counsel from the Texas A&M University System testified in front of both House and Senate committees for the bill.

“Well, the current law says we can’t do revenue sharing,” Texas A&M head coach Mike Elko said of the bill last week at Southeastern Conference Spring Meetings. “So, I would imagine that would be a significant disadvantage for our football programs if everyone else in the country can do revenue sharing and we couldn’t, and so, I think we’re going to need some help there.”

The Texas legislature passed NIL bills in the last two sessions, both of which sailed through the process without much friction.

However, a floor amendment in the Senate was necessary to appease the concerns of senators who worried that financially predatory actors might take advantage of talented children as young as middle school. Now, the law states that universities and third-party entities cannot enter into an NIL contract with an athlete until they are 17. The University Interscholastic League (UIL), the governing body for high school athletics in the state, also has a rule that high school athletes cannot earn NIL compensation.

General council from the A&M System, as well as the Texas Tech University System, confirmed that payments on NIL contracts with universities will not begin until the athlete is enrolled.

“This was one of the toughest bills I’ve carried yet onto the House floor,” shared Tepper. “I wasn’t expecting the challenges I had in committee, and then on the floor. A lot of concerns about the future of NCAA football- that’s not what this bill is about but it seems that a lot of the members wanted to vent their frustration with their concerns about college football, and where this is going.”

The new bill also provides some flexibility. If the NCAA or a new court order changes rules or laws around NIL compensation, the Texas law automatically conforms to those changes without the need for passing new legislation.

Now, athletic directors and coaches across the country wait to see if Judge Claudia Wilken approves the House settlement, making revenue sharing a national standard. However, with this law on the books in Texas, A&M athletic director Trev Alberts said the Aggies might start revenue sharing even if the settlement is not approved.

“I think the general sentiment is, we may just go forward and share revenue anyway,” he said at SEC Spring Meetings. “This is what we want to do. I think we’ve built something that makes a lot of sense, that brings some- stability is the wrong word all the time- but brings some common sense to what we’re doing.”

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PHILADELPHIA – Saint Joseph’s pitcher Colton Book has been selected as the 2025 Philly-SIDA Academic All-Area Baseball Performer of the Year and is one of 12 student-athletes honored for their performance on the field and in the classroom with a spot on the 2025 Philly-SIDA Academic All-Area Baseball Team.
 
The All-Area Team is selected through voting conducted by the sports information offices of 30 institutions in the Philadelphia Metropolitan area.
 
A native of Manheim, Pennsylvania, Book was voted the Atlantic 10 Pitcher of the Year and earned First Team All-Atlantic 10 honors after turning in one of the finest seasons by a hurler in Hawk history.  A four-time Atlantic 10 Pitcher of the Week and named the College Baseball Foundation’s National Pitcher of the Week on February 25, Book spent the season ranked among the top three in Division I in strikeouts before finishing the regular season fifth in the nation.
 
The lefthander is the first pitcher in Saint Joseph’s history to strike out 100 batters in a season, setting a new program record with 122 punchouts for the year, and fanned 13 or more on four different occasions.  Ranking in the top 12 in the country in both WHIP and strikeouts-per-nine-innings at the end of the regular season, he also showed his durability by throwing at least six innings in 10 of his starts, with five starts of seven frames or more.
 
Book was joined on the team by two-time honorees Anthony Bruno of Arcadia and Casey Murphy of Holy Family; also earning All-Area accolades were Kevin Bukowski of Widener, Penn’s Marty Coyne and Jarrett Pokrovsky, Shane Fillman of Penn State Abington, Justin Geiger and Colby Seelig of Chestnut Hill, Immaculata’s Alex LePage, Avery Spencer of West Chester, and Nick Struble of Rowan.
 

A future Kentucky quarterback is going to get vital experience beneath some of the brightest lights in all of high school football.

DJ Hunter is a three-star prospect in the class of 2027 who committed to play for Kentucky in April. He spent his sophomore season playing quarterback for Bearden High School in Knoxville, Tennessee. Hunter got on the Cats’ radar by completing 76-142 passes for 1,431 yards and nine touchdowns in ten games as a starter. The exceptional athlete also rushed for three more scores.

Following the season, his head coach was dismissed after a state investigation into the Bearden High School Booster Club revealed that it had improperly paid two coaches under the table. After the coaching change, Hunter told the Knoxville News he was ready for a change of scenery, seeking out his third high school in three years. He started his career in Horn Lake, MS.

Hunter considered transferring to a school in Central Kentucky. After all, he is committed to Kentucky and has family in the area. Instead, he will transfer to Buford High School in Georgia. If that name sounds familiar, it’s because the school went viral earlier this year. Buford will be playing in a $62 million coliseum this fall.

Buford is a powerhouse program with 14 state titles, including three straight from 2019-21. They went 12-2 last fall and will open their new stadium in a nationally televised game on ESPN. Buford is hosting another regularly nationally ranked program, Milton, on August 14.

You probably won’t be able to see Hunter in action during that game. In January, he suffered a knee injury that may sideline him for the entire season. Buford also already has a pretty good starting quarterback, Dayton Raiola. He’s the younger brother of the Nebraska QB and he’s planning on following those footsteps to Lincoln after the 2025 season.

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