College sports have entered into a new era with the rise of lucrative name, image and likeness deals and revenue sharing. However, a U.S. Senate bill proposes national changes and new regulations for the ever-evolving college sports framework.
For many years, student-athletes were prohibited from earning money that was tied to their athletic identity or NIL. Athletes couldn’t sign endorsement deals, profit from social media or sell NIL merchandise.
Then, in July 2021, the NCAA revised these rules, allowing athletes to profit off of their NIL. According to a report by Opendorse, since 2021, NIL revenue has grown to roughly $2.75 billion, with the highest-paid athlete making an estimated $6.8 million.
Another element was added in June 2025 with the introduction of revenue sharing. The House v. NCAA settlement allowed Division I schools to distribute a portion of their athletics-generated revenue directly to athletes starting in the 2025-26 school year. Following this, power schools began setting aside over $20 million each year to do so.
Schools can distribute up to 22% of the average athletics revenue among all the power schools. According to the College Sports Commission, the revenue-sharing cap for the 2026-2027 school year is estimated at $21.3 million per school. The cap is expected to increase by 4% in the 2027-2028 school year.
The settlement marked the first time schools could legally pay athletes separately from scholarships or outside NIL deals.
On May 27, a bipartisan U.S. Senate bill was introduced, formally known as the Protect College Sports Act of 2026, with Sen. Eric Schmitt of Missouri as a co-sponsor of the bill. The 111-page bill outlines a national standard for NIL rights, grants antitrust protection for the NCAA and codifies athlete protections like medical coverage, trust funds and new transfer rules.
The bill proposes establishing a federal right to earn NIL compensation and would prohibit schools, conferences and the NCAA from preventing athletes from earning or signing NIL deals. It would also allow athletes to maintain their athletic eligibility even with NIL deals.
Athletes would also be required to report NIL agreements worth more than $600 to their institution. However, for athletes to receive an NIL deal, it must have a valid business purpose, which means that the deal must involve promoting a genuine commercial good or service sold to the public for a profit.
“Headline NIL valuations have been inflated by collectives functionally paying for performance, not buying endorsement services,” said Kabeer Bora, a sports economist at Washington University, in an email. “Markets don't price athletes purely at their on-field contribution. Endorsement value reflects what consumers will buy, and consumer preferences are shaped by race, gender and conventional marketability.”
Along with NIL regulations, sports agents would also face new federal rules. Athlete agents working with college athletes would face new federal regulations and disclosure requirements, as well as a 5% cap on agents. The bill is also set to update the Sports Agent Responsibility and Trust Act.
The act regulates how athlete agents can recruit and represent college athletes by enforcing certain rules and regulations, like no inducements, no false promises, mandatory disclosure and notification to the university.
“NIL is great for the athletes to protect them, getting them to the right schools and giving financial support for a rainy day, God forbid, if they can never play again,” said Harold Lewis, president and CEO of the National Sports Agency. “But it happens now with this college revenue sharing, every one of their buddies on their block, or that they went to school with, I can take care of your deal, let me do it. And they're charging these kids 10, 20, 30%.”
The birth of NIL has led many universities to establish NIL collectives, including the University of Missouri with Every True Tiger.
NIL collectives work as independent third-party organizations that pool funds to generate paid opportunities for athletes. These collectives operate outside of the university's control but focus on one school's athletics department.
Now, with the entrance of NIL collectives and revenue sharing, more competition has entered the market. According to a report from the Knight-Newhouse College Athletics Database, Mizzou's athletic expenses were roughly $191 million in 2025 compared to other SEC schools like the University of Texas, which saw expenses reach almost $329 million.
According to Bora, it’s not whether Missouri as a whole can compete but whether Mizzou can compete with other college collectives.
“Whether Mizzou competes for talent under the new rules depends less on whether the St. Louis corporate market is as deep as Atlanta's, and more on whether Mizzou's donor collective can match Alabama's or Oregon's. The state does have nine Fortune 500 headquarters, and that helps. But the binding constraint is donor concentration, not corporate density,” Bora said.
According to a 2025 financial report, Mizzou received $46 million in donations, which was a major increase compared to the previous year's $36 million. However, compared to other SEC schools, Mizzou falls short of schools like Georgia, with $101 million, and Texas A&M, with $88 million in donations.
According to Michelle Brimecombe, assistant teaching professor of sport management at the University of Missouri, for Mizzou to keep building revenue, it needs to look at what else is out in the sports market.
“Whenever we talk about revenue generation, it's always about relationships; it's building those relationships; it's not just going to have alumni support,” Brimecombe said. “Focusing on not just the alumni, but what else is out there.”
The future of the bill continues to be up in the air, with the bill advancing through the Senate Commerce Committee in June and being backed by the NCAA and the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee. However, it faces strong opposition from major conferences, the SEC and the Big Ten. Both argue that the bill requires further revisions.
According to a joint statement from the two conferences, the bill does not provide protections to make and enforce consistent rules for long-term stability in college athletics. The bill alters the House settlement framework on revenue sharing, which the conferences claim would result in fewer student-athletes receiving those payments.
