NC State has brought in eight transfers as part of an all-new roster for year one under Will Wade in Raleigh. Among them, though, was the Wolfpacks’ addition of who Jon Rothstein thinks should be the clear favorite as Preseason ACC Player of the Year.

Rothstein looked at what the candidates for that recognition could look like considering the movement around the league on his show with CBS Sports on Monday. He, after looking around at all the programs, felt that Darrion Williams should “unequivocally” be the choice there as Preseason Player of the Year in the Atlantic Coast Conference.

“I started to dive in last week to the ACC, and you start looking at the personnel of the conference…The bottom line is this. When you’re evaluating next season, returning personnel in the ACC and you’re evaluating the optics of who’s coming into the conference with cachet? It is very difficult to forecast, in some ways, who the best players in the league are going to be entering next season,” said Rothstein. “Duke lost Cooper Flagg, Kon Knueppel, Clemson lost Chase Hunter, Ian Schieffelin. And now you’re looking at what teams have brought in. Louisville did a tremendous job in the transfer portal bringing in Ryan Conwell and Isaac McKneely. Obviously, Duke’s going to bring in a talented freshman class, and also Cam Boozer who I love as a face-up big man.”

“But, I think if you really split the atom, I think if you really look in deep? I think, unequivocally, you look at the personnel, you look at the criteria for the personnel, and then you start looking at the production of the personnel – and Darrion Williams, who transferred from Texas Tech to NC State, should unequivocally be the ACC Preseason Player of the Year,” Rothstein stated.

Williams, who withdrew his name from the 2025 NBA Draft, was the No. 5 player in the portal per On3’s 2025 Top Transfer Portal Players. That’s coming off his career-best season as a junior in Lubbock where he averaged 15.1 points (43.9% FG, 34% 3PT on 1.4 makes), 5.5 rebounds, 3.6 assists, and 1.3 steals per game. He then improved his scoring, rebounding, steals, and three-point makes in their four games of March Madness in reaching the Elite Eight. He did all that while not being the leading contributor in any category for the Red Raiders, which Rothstein expects he’ll now get to be for the Wolfpack.

“Look at what Williams did in the NCAA Tournament last year. Four NCAA Tournament games for the Red Raiders, who advanced all the way to the Elite Eight before losing to Florida in a devastating loss in Northern California. What did Darrion Williams do in those four games? 21 points, seven rebounds, about three assists. That is what you are looking at if you are an NC State fan,” said Rothstein. “This is somebody, again, who was not the focal point for Texas Tech because Texas Tech had the Big 12 Player of the Year and an All-American in JT Toppin. Now Darrion Williams comes to NC State and he gets a bigger bite of the apple. Now Darrion Williams comes to NC State and he gets the opportunity to showcase his ability to be a focal point for Will Wade and the NC State Wolfpack.”

Williams will have to not only produce in a leading role but help NC State, with ten new players led by a Top-30 portal class, to success in their debut under Wade. If Rothstein’s very early projection is right, though, the Wolfpack could have one of the best players in the league, at least based on conference awards, for the first time in around a decade with Williams.

“If you’re looking again at a Preseason All-ACC First Team, I would go with Cam Boozer, I would go with Darrion Williams, I would go with Ryan Conwell…I would also go with Markus Burton, and I would go with Seth Trimble,” said Rothstein.

“It’s really, when you split the atom, based on winning, based on production, and based on the situation that he’s going to find himself in? Darrion Williams from NC State should unequivocally be the ACC Preseason Player of the Year entering the ’25-’26 season – and I don’t think it’s even much of a debate”

The year was 1985. Patrick Ewing patrolled the paint at Georgetown. Chris Mullin was sinking deep jumpers at St. John’s, a year before the NCAA adopted the three-point line.

On Friday, June 6, 2025, Judge Claudia Wilken of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California approved the landmark settlement in the House v. NCAA class action suit (the “House settlement”). The House settlement will fundamentally shift the economics of college athletics, allowing schools to pay Division I players directly and ending the long-standing amateurism model.¹ The settlement also allows former student-athletes, who did not have the opportunity to profit off their publicity rights – i.e., rights in their name, image, and likeness (“NIL”) to collect damages.²

Below, we provide (1) an overview of the House settlement, (2) implications for brands and donors, and (3) issues to monitor post-House settlement.

(1) Overview of the House Settlement

Background

As discussed in prior alerts, the House case is an antitrust suit that was originally filed in 2020 by former student athletes Grant House and Sedona Prince, seeking damages and an injunction to prevent the National Collegiate Athletic Association (“NCAA”) from enforcing alleged anticompetitive restraints that prevented student-athletes from receiving NIL compensation. House was certified as a class action lawsuit in 2023, and an initial settlement was reached in 2024.³ The now-approved settlement covers three combined class action lawsuits brought against the NCAA: House v. NCAA, Hubbard v. NCAA, and Carter v. NCAA.⁴ In 2024, the parties to all three suits agreed to consolidate these cases and settle as part of a broad, 10-year agreement.⁵ The class members of each suit argued that NCAA scholarship limits and the NCAA rules restricting student-athletes’ ability to receive compensation from third parties, schools, and conferences, violated the Sherman Act, alleging that the rules were anti-competitive collusive restraints on trade.

Approval of the House settlement came two months after a final hearing on April 7, 2025, in which Judge Wilken allowed student-athletes and attorneys to address issues and objections that were raised against the settlement.

After iterative settlement agreements were rejected, the final House settlement dated May 7, 2025, addressed two concerns that have been raised since the onset of proceedings, namely, notice to future class members and roster limits.⁶

Damages

Pursuant to the settlement agreement, the consolidated House defendants (the NCAA and Power Five Conferences⁷) will pay $2,576,000,000 into a settlement fund.⁸ This money will be paid annually over the next 10 years and divided among class members according to an allocation plan.⁹ For administration purposes, the class members were divided into three damages classes:

1. Football and Men’s Basketball,¹⁰
2. Women’s Basketball,¹¹ and
3. Additional Sports.¹²

The settlement fund will be split into two funds, a $1.976 billion fund referred to as the “NIL Claims Settlement Amount,” and a $600 million fund referred to as the “Additional Compensation Claims Settlement Amount.”¹³ These two funds will be further divided and distributed based on the sort of injury class members suffered. Specifically, the NIL Claims Settlement Amount will be divided in the following manner: (i) $71.5 million¹⁴ for video game NIL injuries, distributed pro rata to members of the Football and Men’s Basketball class, (ii) $1.815 billion for broadcast NIL (BNIL) injuries, distributed pro rata to members of the Football, Men’s and Women’s Basketball classes, and (iii) $89.5 million for third-party NIL injuries, distributed to athletes who received third-party NIL payments after July 2021 and played during certain years prior to July 2021.¹⁵

The Additional Compensation Claims Settlement Amount will be distributed to members of the damages class with “pay-for-play (i.e., athletic services)” claims.¹⁶ The fund will be distributed as follows: 95% will be allocated to Power Five football and basketball athletes, distributed 75%/15%/5% across football, men’s basketball, and women’s basketball, and will be distributed using a formula that begins with a standard minimum amount, and calculates individual adjustments based on seniority, recruiting rating, and performance statistics.¹⁷ The remaining 5% of the Additional Compensation Net Settlement Fund will be distributed to the “General Portion,” for athletes in other sports, with higher damages awards for those whose non-Power Five teams are among the highest revenue.¹⁸

Class members include all student athletes who were eligible and on a Division I team roster, regardless of the team or conference, between June 15, 2016 and September 15, 2024. To receive settlement payments, eligible athletes must have submitted a claim form for direct payment by January 31, 2025.¹⁹

Injunctive Relief

Injunctive relief under the House settlement is centered around four key provisions:

1. Scholarship limits are eliminated at Division I schools who opt in to the settlement.²⁰
2. The NCAA may prohibit NIL payments to student-athletes by a limited set of Associated Entities or Individuals,²¹ however, the NCAA may not prohibit NIL payments by other third parties.²²
3. Roster limits for each sport must be adopted for Division I schools who opt in; provided that, the House settlement exempts Division I class members whose roster spots were taken in the 2024-25 season or would have been taken away in 2025-26 from roster limits for the duration of their college athletics careers.²³
4. NCAA rules will be modified to permit schools who opt in to the settlement to provide additional direct benefits and compensation to Division I student-athletes that are worth up to 22% of the Power Five schools’ average athletic revenues each year, with yearly increases. This is the Direct Payment model as outlined below.²⁴

The Power Five conferences have established a new legal entity, the College Sports Commission (the “Commission”), which will be responsible for enforcing the settlement provisions related to direct payment, roster limits, and third-party NIL agreements.²⁵

Direct Payment

Under the House settlement, all Division I NCAA schools can choose to opt in or out of the new direct payment model.

Opting In: Division I schools that opt in must comply with the House settlement’s financial terms for directly compensating student athletes. The direct payment model allows for Division I schools to pay a portion of their revenue directly to student-athletes, with $20 million as the cap for the first year (2025-26). The pool cap increases annually²⁶ over the 10-year term of the agreement, reaching a projected $32.9 million in 2034-35. The justification for these direct payments from schools is that money earned by schools via media deals stems from student-athlete NIL. Importantly, the pool cap is the total money that will be distributed from schools directly to student athletes and does not include an athlete’s third-party NIL deals.²⁷ However, if student-athletes are entitled to buyout payments under their agreements and elect to transfer to another school, then their transfer may trigger pool cap reductions. In that instance, the student-athlete’s new school’s pool cap is reduced by the buyout amount and the new school is on the hook for paying the buyout amount to the student-athlete’s prior school.²⁸ For 2025, non-defendant schools should declare their initial intent to opt in no later than June 30, 2025.²⁹

Opting Out: Schools that choose to opt out of the settlement agreement terms will be bound by existing NCAA rules and an evolving framework of state legislation,³⁰ as well as compliance with Title IX and other regulatory authority all schools must abide by.

NCAA Rule Changes

Two of the most contentious NCAA rule changes under the House settlement surround roster limits and the number of scholarships allowed per team for all schools included as defendants in the lawsuit as well as any other schools that opt in to the settlement.

Pursuant to the House settlement, there are no longer limits to the amount of scholarship athletes a school that opts in can have on a team. However, there will be roster limits per sport.³¹

For example, NCAA rules previously limited Division I football programs to 85 full scholarships but put no limit on roster numbers. Under the House settlement, a school football team that opts in can only have 105 players on the roster; however, all of them may receive scholarships.³²

As the settlement took shape, Judge Wilken expressed concerns that the roster limits would deny current athletes the right to continue to participate. As a result, the parties amended the settlement to allow for certain student-athletes to keep their roster spots for the remainder of their college eligibility, at the discretion of their school.³³ The school has the option to exempt from 2025-2026 roster limits any student-athlete that was on a roster during the 2024-2025 school year or any student-athlete entering during the 2025-2026 school year that was recruited or promised a roster spot by the school.³⁴

(2) Implications for Brands and Donors

With the House settlement also comes a change in how NIL deals are administered and regulated across college athletics.

Third parties interested in pursuing NIL deals with student-athletes must understand and adhere to university, state, and NCAA laws and regulations.³⁵ The House settlement stipulates that entities such as booster collectives, referred to as “Associated Entities or Individuals” in the settlement, are permitted to pay student-athletes for the use of their NIL, provided all payments are for a valid business purpose.³⁶ A valid business purpose must be “related to the promotion or endorsement of goods or services provided to the general public for profit, with compensation at rates and terms commensurate with compensation paid to similarly situated individuals with comparable NIL value who are not current or prospective student-athletes at the Member Institution.”³⁷ In other words, the deals with booster collectives and other “Associated Entities and Individuals” must be entered into for the actual purpose of promoting a brand or business at market rates, rather than an athletic services deal, which can be at a higher value than what is considered fair market.

All NIL transactions with a total value of $600 or more must be reported by student-athletes and member institutions to the Commission. Reporting will be done via an online platform called NIL Go, which will be overseen by LBi Software and Deloitte.³⁸ The Commission will be responsible for determining whether reported NIL payments from Associated Entities and Individuals are at fair market value.³⁹ Thus, Associated Entities and Individuals must attempt to determine valuation based on other deals entered into by similarly skilled and similarly famous athletes. Deloitte will use data from past college and professional endorsement deals, along with other relevant data to pinpoint whether each deal exceeds an athlete’s fair market value.⁴⁰

Organizations that are not categorized as “Associated Entities or Individuals” – e.g., athletic apparel, sports drinks, and other consumer brands – may enter NIL deals with student athletes, without the need to comply with the fair market value rule. However, these transactions must also be reported to the NIL Clearinghouse.⁴¹ Brands should keep in mind that sponsored student-athletes must comply with the Federal Trade Commission’s Endorsement Guides⁴² when endorsing a brand’s products (including on social media), which includes disclosure of compensation and other material relationships.

(3) Issues to Monitor Post-House Settlement

While the House settlement will bring some much-needed order to the world of college athlete compensation, there remain a lot of difficult questions that still need to be answered.

Antitrust

Although House was an antitrust suit, issues remain as to the NCAA’s status under antitrust law. The NCAA is seeking an antitrust exemption from Congress.⁴³ Professional sports leagues have such exemptions, allowing the leagues to regulate players more easily.⁴⁴ Although the NCAA has been lobbying Congress since 2021 on this issue with little progress, new draft legislation could give the NCAA the antitrust protection it has been seeking.⁴⁵ Specifically, the draft legislation would prevent legal challenges to direct payments to athletes. Republican lawmakers have also sought Education and Workforce Committee involvement in an effort to prevent student-athletes from becoming employees.⁴⁶

Employment

The issue of employment status of student-athletes remains open. Judge Wilken noted that the unionization and collective bargaining issues were not adjudicated in this litigation.⁴⁷ Should a future suit determine student-athletes are employees under federal or state law, requiring additional compensation, defendants could seek modification of the House settlement.⁴⁸ Ongoing litigation is attempting to resolve the statutory employment issue under the Fair Labor Standards Act, while several collective bargaining cases have been voluntarily dismissed or withdrawn.⁴⁹

Tax

Some state legislatures are working to enact laws that offer tax breaks on NIL earnings in order to compete with states such as Florida and Texas that do not have any income tax.⁵⁰ For instance, a recently introduced bill in North Carolina would permit student-athletes to receive a nonrefundable tax credit, up to 50% of the money owed from NIL income.⁵¹ In Georgia and Alabama, measures were introduced to explicitly exempt NIL earnings from income taxes.⁵² In addition, non-profit colleges and universities preparing to enter into NIL deals with college athletes and third parties will need to be mindful of potential tax implications, including the private benefit doctrine (which generally prohibits 501(c)(3) organizations from conferring more than incidental benefits on private parties), and tax on unrelated business taxable income (“UBTI”) (which requires tax-exempt organizations to pay corporate income tax on certain income that is not substantially related to the organization’s tax-exempt purpose).

Civil Rights

Title IX of the 1972 Education Amendments, a federal civil rights law, has been viewed as a means of requiring schools to distribute equitable opportunities to participate in sports between genders.⁵³ As NIL payments in the NCAA have grown annually since their genesis in 2021, payments from third-party collectives have not been subject to Title IX and have flowed primarily to football and men’s basketball players.⁵⁴ However, going forward, direct payments from schools to athletes must be Title IX compliant.⁵⁵ While objectors raised this issue in the House proceedings, Judge Wilken iterated her focus on antitrust, rather than Title IX, issues.⁵⁶

There are already challenges on the basis of Title IX following the House settlement. For example, a challenge has been raised by eight female student-athletes alleging the disproportionate nature of the back damages portion of the settlement.⁵⁷ This appeal will not influence the implementation of direct payments beginning on July 1, 2025; however, damage payments will now cease pending outcome of that appeal.⁵⁸ Additional Title IX claims in connection with the House settlement are likely to arise in the coming days and months.⁵⁹

Direct Payments

Schools have been aware of the general contours of the House settlement and have been preparing for months following the announcement of the initial settlement in May 2024. Many schools are exploring creative ways to brace themselves financially for direct payments to athletes beginning on July 1, 2025, including possibly spinning out different entities for their athletics programs, private equity financing, and other alternatives. Virginia Tech has announced it will increase tuition and fees for the 2025-2026 academic year, with a large portion going towards helping its athletics program fund direct payments to athletes,⁶⁰ while Kentucky announced its athletic department would transition to a separate nonprofit limited liability company.⁶¹

Schools outside the Power 5 conferences are still mulling their decisions regarding opting in to the House settlement ahead of the June 30 deadline.

The Ivy League announced months before the settlement’s approval that all eight member institutions will not be opting in, with the conference intent on keeping its educational intercollegiate athletics model intact.⁶²

For other schools, opting in may result in drastic measures such as eliminating certain varsity sports, or even reclassifying to a lower division, both of which have already occurred.⁶³ University of North Carolina Asheville announced its decision that it will not opt in to the settlement for the 2025-2026 school year, stating, “the revenue generated by our athletic department is essential for enhancing and sustaining various aspects of our program, including scholarships, sports medicine services, mental health resources, and more. At this time, opting into the House Settlement would not be advantageous for our long-term success.”⁶⁴

While certain schools are well equipped to handle the financial undertaking of the new landscape, others are still determining the best course of action for their athletic departments.

Efficacy of NCAA Enforcement Arm

Although athletic conference commissioners are reportedly confident in the Commission and its ability to successfully oversee enforcement,⁶⁵ some critics are skeptical as to the effectiveness of the new enforcement arm. Specifically, some coaches, and athletics administrators have argued that the prior system, where recruiting inducements are disguised as NIL payments, will not be easily eliminated.⁶⁶ The emergence of NIL collectives puts boosters and collectives at the forefront of college athletics, with the amount paid to student-athletes on some college football rosters alone nearing or exceeding the $20.5 million in annual direct payments allowed by athletic departments under the House settlement.⁶⁷

Although the House settlement imposes restrictions on payments by Associated Entities including collectives, it is unlikely that NIL collectives will take a back seat despite the settlement. Especially in the early days of the Commission, it is likely that collectives will look for workarounds, or in the alternative, revert to exercising their influence behind the scenes as they once did pre-NIL era as boosters.⁶⁸

Conclusion

Some may say that “it’s been a long time coming” for college sports as student-athletes, schools, and the NCAA enter into this post-House era. We will continue to monitor the legal issues and developments of this era, and any to come.