Power conferences want the freedom to use their respective TV contract fortunes to provide more assistance to their student-athletes. Everyone else fears a future without the biggest names in college sports. And thus, this is the state of politics in Division I.
On Tuesday, the NCAA released a new voting model sponsored by its steering committee, which would give more of a voice to the five power conferences - ACC, SEC, Big Ten, Big 12 and Pac-12 - and give student-athletes (well, two of them) a place at the table.
Under the new structure, the five power conferences would have four votes apiece, the five remaining FBS conferences (American, Conference USA, MAC, Mountain West and Sun Belt) would have two votes each, the remaining 22 Division I conferences (FCS and non-football leagues) would have one vote each, and two student-athlete representatives would have one vote each.
Presently, power conferences occupy 29.4 percent of the voting table, the rest of FBS has 15.8 percent of the votes and the remainder of Division I has a 52.7 percent majority.
If you work at an FBS school, this is good news for you.
The next step of the process comes on April 24, when the Division I Board of Directors puts it to a vote.