In a meeting with the university’s Board of Trustees, Ohio State University athletic director Ross Bjork explained upcoming policy changes, many of which stem from the House v. NCAA court decision, according to the Columbus Dispatch.
While Bjork affirmed the University’s desire to retain all 36 of its varsity sports teams, he expects the university to lose 150 student-athletes in compliance with the court decision’s roster limits.
University President Ted Carter also said that some varsity teams “…may start to act a little bit more like a club sport.”
House v. NCAA was filed by former Arizona State swimmer Grant House in 2020. The antitrust lawsuit challenged the NCAA rule that restricted student-athletes in profiting from their name, image, and likeness (NIL). The ruling gave student-athletes more leeway to profit from their NIL. Additionally, the ruling mandated $2.8 billion in back payment to former student-athletes, permitted athletic departments to revenue share with student-athletes, eliminated team scholarship limits, and imposed roster size limits.
According to Bjork, athletic departments will use the ruling as a roadmap for policy and budget decisions in the near future. With respect to back payments, he believes most money will go to former men’s football and basketball players, the two historically most profitable college sports.
In 2025, Ohio State will remove scholarship limits per team and impose roster limits in compliance with the ruling. Bjork expects to lose approximately 150 student-athletes as a consequence of the rule changes. He stated that some teams may begin to resemble club teams in operation but still travel and compete at the Division I level.
Ohio State has a women’s and a men’s varsity swim team, both of which were the runner-ups at the 2024 Big Ten Conference Championship. The men’s team has 11 NCAA team titles to their name, and recent alumna Hunter Armstrong is a two-time Olympic gold medalist.
According to the USA Today, Ohio State’s athletic department generated $251.6 million in revenue in the last fiscal year, ranking it first in the nation and the second highest revenue ever earned by an athletic department in a single year. Its 36 sport sponsorship is more-than-double the 14 mandated by the NCAA for NCAA Division I membership and one of the highest varsity sponsorship counts in the NCAA.
A previous version of this article misattributed a quote from Ted Carter to Ross Bjork. This has been corrected.
I posted this verbatim on another article. May answer some of the commenters’ questions:
In discussions with a Sr Admin at a Power 4 school, here’s the school’s interpretation:
1. Settlements equate to $22m annually.
2. All SA’s to get an equal share or risk legal action.
3. Title IX does apply if the school receives federal funding.
4. Current NCAA D1 bylaws require sponsorship of 16 sports. Football and MBB are untouchable. Add sports to stay in compliance with Title IX and sport sponsorship minimums from there.
5. Roster management emerges to satisfy #1 and #4.
6. No more walk-ons to comply with #2.
7. If the NCAA votes to lower the… Read more »
This is very well laid out. I have often heard the same as far as most ADs preferring football and MBB only (and maybe in certain places a women’s sport that makes profit, such as basketball or volleyball). At the end of the day, they’re running a business and most sports are costing millions and millions of dollars with bringing in very little, if anything.
Hate seeing so many kids losing opportunities to compete and entire programs getting cut. But maybe this is where D2/D3 gains prominence. I have a feeling we’ll start to see more and more higher level Olympic sport athletes at D2 and D3 schools with a bunch of D1s certainly likely to cut Olympic sport… Read more »
The whole situation begs for Congressional intervention. Public colleges, as state governmental institutions, are not subject to antitrust laws (e.g state liquor monopolies), so it may be that the NCAA disintegrates and various institutions form new and different alliances. Universities already sponsor and fund a variety of clubs via student fees – funds assessed and allocated based upon the level of student interest and participation – that would suggest that clubs may have no roster limits since more participants equals a better argument for more funding. Colleges desiring to offer students a more wholistic environment will always fund sport activities as well as other student organizations, however the number of schools offering full scholarship funded teams will shrink as schools… Read more »
*alumnus
I find the roster limit idea to be so confusing and unnecessary. Why can’t you have “volunteers” just like the old system where you had walk-ons? This new system of roster limits feels so self destructive. Also, how is it that Auburn has 13 incoming male freshman (I am too lazy to provide the link- just look at their most recent signing announcement on this website) if a 25 swimmer roster limit is going to start next year? None of this makes sense to me.
That is what is scheduled to be if implemented. Which means coaches will have to cut student-athletes from their roster (either currently on their team or incoming). These are already occurring in anticipation of the announcement as some coaches have made cuts spring through summer or notifying verbal commits for class of 2025 and 2026 that they may lose their spot if this is put into action.
Let’s not overreact. Ohio State is a bit of a special circumstance. I’ll share some facts the article did not cover.
For starters, Ohio State was the richest athletic program in the country last year. According to numbers published, I’ve seen $279.5m. Texas A&M was #2 at $279.1m. An interesting note is that Ross Bjork, OSU’s Athletic Director, was previously at Texas A&M; so there is some obvious reason to compare the two.
Let’s look at these 2 athletic programs:
Varsity Sports:
Texas A&M: 20
Ohio State: 36
Sports both schools share:
Mens: Baseball, Basketball, Cross Country, Football, Golf, Swim & Dive, Tennis, Track & Field
Womens: Basketball, Cross Country, Golf, Soccer, Softball, Swim &… Read more »
If the richest Athletic Dept in the entire NCAA is is going to feel the pinch, then what do you think is going to happen at other schools that are already struggling for funding? It’s almost certainty that collegiate swimming, especially men’s swimming, is going to see: programs cut, roster sizes reduced, and funding (and scholarships) reduced. That’s just the reality we’re facing.
I left out a comment to the statement, “Bjork expects to lose approximately 150 student-athletes as a consequence of the rule changes.” A good amount of these losses are related to roster limits. This is worth pointing out as well.
True and Matt Grant publisher of Extra Points had this to say:
https://drvco.omeclk.com/portal/wts/ue%5EcnC-c8gDbaM79aABtrq7j2z3b
i read your list as 19 more sports at OSU. And you don’t list artistic swimming. But agree that they are a very large (the largest?) collegiate athletic program.
All of this NIL “stuff” be what it may- good or bad or a mix of both. Ultimately, it might be a really good time to ask the all important question- “What can be done to improve the viability of competitive swimming overall, not just in the NCAA/College landscape?” Said differently, how can swimming take this opportunity to augment viewership around the globe? Of course the banner event for the sport is the Olympics. And, aside from probably the 100M track events for both women and men, swimming draws the most eyeballs at the Olympic Games. The USA Olympic Trials were very successful in terms of TV audience and in-person attendance (despite a number of folks on here criticizing). This… Read more »
Not a fan of Ross. It’s amazing that he failed upward when he was on the brink of firing at A&M and somehow managed to land at one of the few athletic departments that is actually richer than A&M.
Not blaming him for this current situation in athletics at all, just mentioning that.
pivoting from a guy who wanted to run a successful athletic department to a guy who will get the donor-class paypigs to shell out more football money. that was the sole justification.
iirc they were leaning towards jarmond and chun – who were gene smith protoges – before the boosters stepped in and demanded that they get someone who would be laser-focused on football.
they won’t be the only school to do this, but as an osu alum the carter and bjork hires looked bad at the time and have gotten even worse – and they’ve each only been on the job for a few months.