30 Years of Inaction: Why the NCAA Lost Control of College Sports

The NCAA… it’s pretty much a consensus across all stakeholders that the blame for where we are today with college athletics falls squarely on the NCAA’s shoulders. It seems logical—and it's an easy thing to throw out when complaining about the NIL war chests at places like Texas and Ohio State. But let’s actually look under the hood to validate that claim.

First Stop: The Money

In the mid-1980s and into the '90s, ESPN became a national broadcast power, feeding the growing appetite for nonstop sports content. As a result, conferences, schools, and the NCAA started signing much more lucrative TV deals. For example, Notre Dame inked its first exclusive agreement with NBC in 1990, worth around $40 million. By the end of the decade, the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament had a $6 billion deal with CBS. The revenue arms race had begun.

Conferences saw the value in expanding their geographic reach to tap into new TV markets. Penn State joined the Big Ten in 1990. South Carolina and Arkansas joined the SEC shortly after. More teams meant more eyeballs, more revenue, more power.

Add in college superstars like the Fab Five, Peyton Manning, Larry Johnson, Rebecca Lobo, and coaching legends like Coach K, Bobby Bowden, and Pat Summitt, and the NCAA became a money-making machine—TV deals, merchandise, video games (shoutout to Pizza Hut March Madness Basketball), the works.

Second Stop: The NCAA’s Crucial Misstep

You might wonder why the NCAA wasn’t in the driver’s seat during all this growth. That inflection point was NCAA v. Board of Regents of the University of Oklahoma.

Before the 1980s, the NCAA controlled all football TV rights and determined which teams were featured during the single national broadcast slot on ABC each week. In response, schools formed the College Football Association to negotiate their own TV deals for better exposure. The NCAA tried to shut them down by threatening to ban member schools from all NCAA events.

That backfired. Oklahoma and Georgia sued the NCAA, and after a years-long legal battle, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the schools, declaring that the NCAA's practices violated antitrust laws. At that point, NCAA lost significant power to manage these TV deals, and in-turn lost much ability to manage the flow of the ever-growing revenue.

Third Stop: Head in the Sand

Post-lawsuit, the NCAA leaned into denial. In 1996, Executive Director Cedric Dempsey floated soft ideas about adjusting the definition of amateurism. Even then, he admitted that many in college athletics would find such ideas "totally out of the question." Meanwhile, Wake Forest President Thomas Hearn made his stance crystal clear: "It’s much more important that we preserve the distinctiveness of the college game."

So while revenues rose, the NCAA clung to its outdated model. They refused to adapt to public opinion or economic reality, and instead allowed the courts to dictate their future through case after case.

Fourth Stop: Ed O’Bannon Floodgates

Money kept pouring in—except to the athletes. Then in 2009, former UCLA basketball player Ed O’Bannon sued the NCAA for using his likeness in EA Sports video games without compensation. He won in 2014. Athletes now had the right to their own name, image, and likeness.

That moment cracked everything open. (Fun fact: I got a $15 check from the O’Bannon case—the only money I ever earned from my basketball career.)

The NCAA then lost NCAA v. Alston in 2021 (again, antitrust), and they're now in trouble with House v. NCAA (revenue sharing) and Johnson v. NCAA (employee classification).

Meanwhile, NIL collectives popped up, the NCAA stepped back, and over 30 states enacted their own NIL laws, creating a patchwork of uneven playing fields. As conferences gained more power and more money, the NCAA chose to do… nothing.

So, Can You Really Blame Charlie Baker?

He showed up on day one, looked at the mess left behind by Mark Emmert, and probably said, "What the hell do you want me to do with this?"

It took 30+ years to get here, and it will take immense effort to fix it. But let’s be clear: expecting the NCAA to be that change agent is wishful thinking. They are structurally and philosophically unfit to lead.

Final Thoughts

Don’t get mad at today’s NCAA. None of the people currently there created this mess—Charlie Baker included. They’re doing what they can with the scraps of authority they have left.

We need a new leader or group to take the reins. There are only two realistic options: the Power 4 conferences or Congress. And in my view, it has to be the conferences. (Despite Baker basically begging the government to do something).

Case in point: the ACC just reported ~$700 million in revenue for 2024-25, and the Big Ten, SEC, and Big 12 are expected to surpass that. Together, they’ll generate about $3 billion this year. Now imagine what they could do if they unified into a single league and negotiated as one.

In 2024, the NFL generated over $23 billion.

Hey Power 4: Just imagine the possibilities.