A Tuesday email from Ivy League executive director Robin Harris addressed to league coaches and student-athletes reported the league would opt out of the revenue-sharing element of a pending $2.8 billion NCAA settlement forged last year aimed at paying athletes a share of the revenue colleges made from their performances.
In May 2024, the NCAA announced a $2.8 billion settlement to cover “back pay” to student-athletes from 2016 to 2024 resulting from lost name, image and likeness (NIL) money.
NCAA reserves are to cover 40% of the fund, with the other 60% coming from the 33 conferences, including the “power-five” conferences taking on 40% of that portion and non-power-five conferences paying 60%.
Former Ivy League student-athletes haven the right to submit claims, which are predicated upon their appearances in video games and on television, through Jan. 31, 2025.
The other component of the settlement permits schools and conferences to share their television and ticket revenue with student-athletes. It is this component of the settlement from which the Ivy League has opted out.
The Ivy League “will continue to not provide student-athletes with revenue sharing allocations, athletic scholarships, or direct payments,” Harris said in the email.
The decision was made by the Ivy League Council of Presidents after consultation with Ivy athletic directors and is rumored to have been unanimous.
“As college athletics evolves and Division I leagues understand the need to compensate the student-athletes their fair shares, it’s certainly disappointing that the Ivy League believes that it deserves to participate at the highest level of the sport but not obligate itself to hold itself to the same standards,” Jason Belzer, noted sports law professor and founder of SANIL (Student Athlete Name Image and Likeness), a group that works to provide NIL opportunities to student-athletes.
The settlement calls for roster maximums and such factor was submitted as one of the rationales for the opt out.
College football will be capped at 105 players, college baseball at 34 players and college softball at 25 players.
The Ivy League essentially is asserting that while schools like Ohio State and Alabama will have 105 football players on roster, Ivy League teams may need more, presumably to enhance the student-athlete experience. That seems strange and disingenuous at a minimum.
Even though the Ivy League and its member institutions contend that they are in favor of legitimate NIL, meaning not pay-for-play, the league has actively discouraged NIL collectives. Collectives can’t be prohibited because all available NCAA rules and state statutes permit them.
There are no known Ivy collectives, but some Ivy League coaches acknowledge that certain Ivy student-athletes currently receive compensation.
The Ivy League lost great talents last spring to NIL-paying universities, such as Yale’s Danny Wolf to Michigan, Harvard’s Malik Mack to Georgetown and Penn’s Tyler Perkins to Villanova. It is feared that this opt out will lead to a further exodus of talented student-athletes to non-Ivy institutions.
Richard, I agree this is regrettable. If any conference can afford to compensate its athletes, it’s the Ivy League. I honestly don’t understand this decision.
Once Caden Pierce graduates, the Ivy will never see a four-year elite talent ever again. Not with the current rules.
Princeton and Yale’s recent success against high majors has brainwashed the powers that be into thinking everything’s fine. In two years, this league will be a low-major conference.
As John Feinstein opines Ivy administrators are no different than other colleges in that define: “Our policies are in the the best interests of our student athletes”. The Ivies have held themselves to the “no pay for play” rule going back to the Big 3 of 1917, the 1945 8 school agreement, and the 1954 formal agreement of the Ivy Group which is 70 years ago!
One would hope that the Ivy Student Athlete Advisory Committee pushes back this outdated policy. otherwise more Ivy athletes will be entering the portal. Also highly recommend that one read Larken Kemp’s article in Inside Lacrosse on the effect NIL may have on Ivy Lacrosse.