One vote now stands in between college sports and full-fledged free agency.
The NCAA's Division I Council on Thursday formally endorsed a long-awaited new transfer policy, which would allow all D1 athletes a one-time waiver to transfer and compete immediately.
The new policy cannot become officially official until it is approved by the Division I Board of Directors, which meets April 28.
Football players will have until May 1 of each year to notify their current institutions of their intent to transfer and compete elsewhere that fall, but that deadline has been extended to July 1 for this year.
July 1 also happens to be the soft deadline for when the NCAA needs to have a national NIL policy hammered out, because that's the date Florida's state law goes into effect.
It's no coincidence, of course, that the NCAA adopted this landmark change just as it wages a bigger battle that stands to completely upend the status quo inside college athletics.
“Allowing student-athletes a one-time opportunity to transfer and compete immediately provides a uniform, equitable and understandable approach that benefits all student-athletes,” said Council vice chair Jon Steinbrecher, who chairs the Working Group on Transfers and is commissioner of the Mid-American Conference. “The decision is consistent with Division I’s goal of modernizing its rules to prioritize student-athlete opportunity and choice.”
As players enjoy unprecedented and unlimited freedom of movement, the next question will be if and how the NCAA will adjust its 85-man scholarship limits and the 25-man initial counter rule in the FBS.
“Our position as a football oversight committee was: Let’s let this thing play out a little and not rush to judgment,” West Virginia athletic director Shane Lyons told the AP. “If we start seeing a complete trend, then we can go back and revisit it.”
As always, stay tuned to The Scoop for the latest.