NCAA, power conferences announce formalization of House v. NCAA settlement committee, enforcement entity

The power conferences and NCAA announced the formalization of the House v. NCAA settlement implementation committee on Wednesday, another step that moves college sports closer to the revenue-sharing era. The committee includes two athletic directors from each of the five conferences and will be responsible for the settlement’s implementation and enforcement.

Because the ACC, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-12, SEC and NCAA are the named defendants of the lawsuit, they are charged with regulating and enforcing the settlement. When the suit was filed, the Pac-12 still had 12 members.

The committee has met multiple times in recent months ahead of April’s final approval hearing in front of Judge Claudia Wilken in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California. Among the tasks of the athletic director group will be drafting rules to facilitate compliance, creating a system to ensure that NIL deals are legitimate and forming an entity to enforce the settlement rules.

Specifically, the new entity will take charge of investigating and handing out penalties for rev-share violations, while the NCAA handles academics, playing rules and championships. It gives the conferences more power to come down with enforcement than ever before, shifting away from the NCAA.

If the House v. NCAA settlement is ultimately approved, some $2.75 billion in damages will be paid to thousands of college athletes over 10 years. And schools, at their discretion, will be able to share $20.5 million with athletes in Year One of the 10-year settlement. The figure equates to 22% of the average Power Five school’s revenue. It will rise 4% each year.

The group of 10 athletic directors on the committee includes:

• Trev Alberts, Texas A&M 
• Scott Barnes, Oregon State 
• Mitch Barnhart, Kentucky 
• J Batt, Georgia Tech 
• Ross Bjork, Ohio State
• Pat Chun, Washington 
• John Cunningham, Cincinnati 
• Graham Neff, Clemson 
• Anne McCoy, Washington State 
• Desireé Reed-Francois, Arizona 

As part of the committee’s role, it will develop a digital platform for the reporting and measurement of payments made to athletes by their institutions to ensure compliance with the cap set forth in the proposed settlement. The conferences have retained LBi Software as a cap management and reporting platform.

Deloitte has also been contracted to create a system to track and evaluate third-party NIL deals valued at more than $600, which is required under the settlement. The enforcement entity will “evaluate whether these deals are within a reasonable range of compensation and made with the purpose of using a student-athlete’s NIL to advance a valid business purpose, as outlined in the proposed settlement,” according to the conferences.