NIL
Tennessee passes NIL legislation
Here are the key takeaways:
Tennessee schools can directly arrange and provide NIL deals to athletes unless they’re explicitly blocked by federal law or a binding court order.
The NCAA can’t punish schools in Tennessee (i.e., Tennessee, Vanderbilt, or Memphis) for participating in NIL activities that are legal under state law.
Athletes can’t lose eligibility over NIL income, and their scholarships won’t be impacted by it either.
The law protects schools from lawsuits for their involvement in NIL deals and shields internal NIL records from open records requests—meaning it’ll be harder for the public to see where the money’s going.
Private colleges (like Vanderbilt) can opt out of parts of the law if they agree with the NCAA to follow its rules instead.