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The “House vs. NCAA” case is having a major impact on college athletics — and college football, specifically — as more details emerge from the groundbreaking settlement.
The headline from the settlement was all about revenue sharing, with universities able to share $20 million or more per year with their athletes starting in the 2025-26 academic year, but more details have emerged this week about new roster limits for sports.
According to Yahoo Sports’ Ross Dellenger, as part of the settlement, schools are now permitted to offer scholarships to every player on a sports’ roster, with power conference commissioners finalizing those limits last week. According to data from The Athletic, there could be a substantial increase of scholarships across a university’s athletic department, depending on the sports it sponsors.
For Utah, which sponsors 18 sports — baseball, men’s and women’s basketball, women’s cross-country, football, men’s golf, gymnastics, men’s lacrosse, combined men’s and women’s skiing, women’s soccer, softball, men’s and women’s swimming and diving, women’s track and field, volleyball and beach volleyball — it now has around 226 new scholarships to distribute if it fills the maximum roster for each of those sports.
For example, college baseball, which had a scholarship limit of 11.7 previously, now has a roster limit of 34 — and scholarships can be awarded to every player on the roster.
College football, which currently has a scholarship limit of 85, will have a roster limit of 105 in 2025, with scholarships available to all players on the team.
This change could effectively end the practice of walk-on players, who currently make up nearly 30% of Division I college football rosters. Walk-ons practice and play with the team but do not receive a scholarship and have to pay their own way through school.
While the settlement is good news for up to 20 walk-ons that will be awarded scholarships, it also will mean the elimination of up to 15 spots on each team, down from the current NCAA maximum roster size of 120.
According to its 2024 roster, Utah has 109 players currently — though the Utes typically add some walk-on players during fall camp to get to 120. In 2023, the Utes fielded the full complement of 120 players.
“That’s getting down to the bare bones,” Utah coach Kyle Whittingham said of the upcoming roster changes on Monday.
With no ability to add players after the season starts in case of injuries, like the NFL does, the longtime Utah coach worries about rosters being too “thin” by the end of the season, especially if a team makes a deep playoff run, which could mean playing up to 16 or 17 games between the regular season, conference championship game and playoff games — similar to the length of the NFL regular season.
The positive, Whittingham says, is the opportunity for more players to be on scholarship.
The downside is that less players overall will be able to make a roster. Most Division I teams have 120 players on the roster, and with 15 fewer players on each of the 134 Division I teams, it could be a loss of over 2,000 roster spots.
“That’s a lot of ball players that won’t have the opportunity to play Division I football,” Whittingham said.
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From the archives
Extra points
- Former Utes come up big as Canada 3x3 women’s basketball stays unbeaten in Olympic pool play (Deseret News)
- Utah football beats BYU, UCLA for commitment from California lineman Semi Taulanga (Deseret News)
