Some Changes Possible to Transfer Portal, Letter-of-Intent, and NIL Rules Clarified.

(The Athletic, the NCAA.org website, and ESPN contributed to this story.)

STILLWATER – I did some texting back and forth Wednesday night with Oklahoma State women’s tennis head coach and assistant athletic director for tennis Chris Young, Young is in Indianapolis for the Division I Tennis Committee of which he is a member.

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Chris Young (in the middle) and his program will host the NCAA Tennis Championships next May.

“Hey the Division I Council is in the room right next to us,” Young said. “There are some heavy hitters in there and they are making some major rules, looking at some really important things.”

Yes they are, and somehow some of those continue to creep out despite their meetings being closed to the media. I also haven’t heard of any press conferences or briefings going on with those.

Everybody is talking NIL and while some states such as Texas and even Oklahoma (not signed by Governor Stitt) have legislation in place that their schools can do as they please and follow state NIL laws and not answer to the NCAA. The NCAA made it clear in a memo sent out to schools this week that is not the case.

“The Association has been clear and maintains that schools must adhere to NCAA legislation (or policy) when it conflicts with permissive state laws,” read the memo sent by Stan Wilcox, the NCAA executive vice president of regulatory affairs. “In other words, if a state law permits certain institutional action and NCAA legislation prohibits the same action, institutions must follow NCAA legislation.”

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Bjork says the Aggies will follow Texas state law and not the NCAA with NIL.

Texas A&M athletics director Ross Bjork said he doesn’t care. 

“The state law is going to govern how we do business,” Bjork told ESPN on Tuesday of this week after receiving the memo. “We will continue to communicate with the NCAA on a variety of matters, but in terms of this, the state law will reign.”

This has to make schools like Oklahoma State that may end up being one of the final schools to really get jobbed by the NCAA over the basketball case with former assistant coach Lamont Evans caught in the FBI sting, but Oklahoma State having gained no advantage what so ever being punished with a post season ban.

Here is another hot button topic, the transfer portal. 

The Division I Council has introduced a proposal to shorten transfer windows to 30 days, down from the current 60-day period. Some are split like football and basketball. The windows have been in effect for only one year, but that has provided enough data for the NCAA to determine that most athletes enter the portal at the beginning of the window. A shorter window would simplify the task of coaches in their efforts to manage and reconstruct their rosters. 

Football has used two windows with the first one after the season being the longer 45-day window and then the shorter 15-day window after all teams have completed spring football. That second window is the one coaches really don’t like dealing with. 

© Nathan J Fish/The Oklahoman / USA TODAY NETWORK

Gundy speaking with the media this spring.

"I'm not a big fan of the portal in the spring, because it's extremely difficult to replace roster numbers,” Oklahoma State head coach Mike Gundy said to a media gathering this spring. “But, I don't make the rules and standards I just adjust to them as they go."

Gundy and many other coaches except maybe Colorado’s Deion Sanders would like to see the spring window eliminated. SEC commissioner Greg Sankey, a member of the Division I Council didn’t say that, just that the first portal window could be shortened.

“What you saw when the portal opened, the day after bowl placement, the first week or two was the exact behavior anticipated,” Sankey said on “The Joel Klatt Show” on FOX. “A lot of people who didn’t get playing time or didn’t make the right decisions raised their hand and said I would like to leave. After those two weeks, you had a lot of third parties and agents saying, ‘I’ve got a deal for you if you leave.’”

Finally, the governing body for the national letter of intent program around since 1964 where athletes sign the letter committing them to and biinding them to a school for a calendar year. The NLI process is overseen by the Collegiate Commissioners Association.

The changes:

Following a committee review of NLI policy, the Collegiate Commissioners Association will not penalize an athlete who requests a release due to a head coaching change. Neither will an athlete be penalized for leaving their original school after one quarter or one semester as long as a release is requested.

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Signing day for the Shettrons at Santa Fe H.S.

The policy change takes effect with the 2023-24 signing periods for 2024-25 enrollees.

The CCA also will expand the program to provide an athlete transferring from one four-year school to another an opportunity to sign an NLI as long as he or she has entered the NCAA transfer portal.

Big Sky Conference Commissioner Tom Wistrcill, chair of the NLI Policy and Review Committee, said the changes are meant to modernize the NLI program so it more accurately reflects the recruiting landscape