The House settlement (In re Coll. Athlete NIL Litig., No. 20-CV-03919 CW, 2025 WL 1675820 (N.D. Cal. June 6, 2025)) has ushered in a new era of revenue sharing in college athletics, adding to the massive economic and power shift toward athletes that began with the landmark O’Bannon and Alston cases. O’Bannon v. Nat’l Collegiate Athletic Ass’n, 802 F.3d 1049 (9th Cir. 2015), (Nat’l Collegiate Athletic Ass’n v. Alston, 594 U.S. 69 (2021). In establishing and protecting college athletes’ name, image, and likeness (NIL) rights and allowing them to fully monetize their collegiate athletics experience, the settlement created an economic relationship between universities and their athletes – particularly in the revenue-generating sports at the highest levels of collegiate athletics – that more closely resembles the one between employers and employees than ever before. Both legal commentators and collegiate athletics stakeholders are acknowledging the eventuality of employment and collective bargaining in college athletics. With NIL and compensation now resolved, the next big question in college athletics is when – not if – college athletes will become employees and what collective bargaining could look like in college athletics.

Johnson v. NCAA (Johnson v. Nat’l Collegiate Athletic Ass’n, 108 F.4th 163 (3d Cir. 2024)), President Trump’s Saving College Sports executive order, the Student Compensation and Opportunity through Rights and Endorsements (SCORE) Act (H.R. 4312, 119th Cong. (2025)), and ongoing efforts to lobby Congress broadly on collegiate athletics are all in motion and will ultimately decide college athletics’ employment question.

Click here to read the full article written by Jarrod Loadholt, Tiffany Releford, and Jotionette Jones published in Sports Litigation Alert.