The NCAA, which is the main governing body for all college sports, has gone through a major transformation these past couple of years. First, there was the NIL ruling, which now allows student athletes to make money through endorsement contracts and with their name, image and likeness (hence the term NIL). This new rule changed the landscape of the college sports ecosystem and has led to the fact that it is sometimes more lucrative for an athlete to come to (or stay in) college than to turn professional. While this change has been more of a factor for the “big money” sports like American football and basketball, it has definitely also affected sports like golf, tennis and soccer as well.
About two years later came the next massive rules change, when the NCAA introduced roster limits. So what happened here is that while schools could offer student athletes more scholarships on average, the roster sizes started being limited to a certain number of athletes for each sport at the NCAA Division 1 level. For instance, in NCAA Division 1 golf, rosters were now being limited to a maximum of 9 players per team. This led to some very delicate situations for coaches and some very uncomfortable conversations that they needed to have with current players or players who had already committed to their program. To be more specific, a team with let’s say 11 players “under contract” for the coming season, needed to all of a sudden get that number down to 9, meaning that the coaches needed to basically get rid of two players.
Then over this past summer came the third big change (and hopefully the last one for a while), when the NCAA agreed to give each student athlete a 5th year of eligibility, meaning that every athlete can now compete for five years and not just four as it was the case before. Since this rule went into effect straight away, coaches again were left with a lot of uncertainty, because current athletes who were in their last year, all of a sudden could stay and compete for an extra year. The result of this, combined with the roster limits that were imposed shortly before that, now meant that coaches again were in a situation where they potentially needed to get rid of a player or two just to get below the roster limit number for their specific sport.
While all these changes are positive and will be great for college sports in the long run, it does make the situation a bit tricky for the 2027 class. All three rules changes have led to the fact that there are less scholarships and less roster spots available, all while more athletes are actually looking to come to or stay in college. The result is that NCAA Division 1 opportunities are very limited for 2027 and there has definitely been a trickle down effect, with less spots even being available at the division 2 level. So what we are seeing is that a lot of potential D1 recruits are now committing to D2, NAIA or junior college programs, to make sure that they have a place to play next fall. Again, this is not a huge issue as there are fantastic opportunities at every level and in every division. And, with transferring becoming more and more common in college sports, we actually highly recommend going down that route, with the chance of potentially transferring after two years once things have gone back to normal and coaches have had time to adjust to the new landscape. And don’t worry, we are here to guide you all the way and will still be able to make your college experience memorable, just like we have been doing for years!