New Transfer Window Opens
Fallout from the House settlement continues to roll in. The NCAA has approved a new transfer portal window, which opened on July 7 and will close on August 5. However, this window will only be open for college athletes who are named “designated student-athletes” (DSAs) by their schools.
This DSA list, however, is pretty niche. As part of the House settlement, NCAA football teams now have a 105-player roster cap but are also allowed to place all of those players on scholarship. Previously, teams could only hold 85 scholarship athletes but were allotted unlimited walk-ons. The DSAs are the players who would have been removed from the roster due to this new cap but were on the team during the 2024-25 season (a “grandfathering,” if you will), according to Yahoo’s Ross Dellenger. The deadline for schools to add players to this list, which they were expected to do in good faith, was July 6.
This is not expected to make a big splash. Only walk-ons or end-of-roster players who were “grandfathered” into the new roster cap would benefit from trying to earn a starting spot at a different school.
EA Sports College Football 26 Launches
After its triumphant return in 2024, the EA Sports college football series is back for its second installment in as many years. The game launched on Monday, July 7, for those who had purchased early access and on Thursday, July 10, for everyone else. The franchise overhauled its game presentation features and added real-life CFB coaches, among other changes.
Penn State’s Nicholas Singleton (96 OVR), Dani Dennis-Sutton (92 OVR), Drew Allar (92 OVR), Vega Ioane (91 OVR), and Kaytron Allen (91 OVR) are among the game’s highest-rated players.
Big 12 Commissioner Makes Waves
Big 12 Commissioner Brett Yormark spoke at his conference’s media day on Tuesday, sparking some discussion about the future of the College Football Playoff and conference hierarchy. The conference previously made headlines at the end of June after it announced it was nixing its preseason poll, prompting C-USA to follow suit. Notably, Arizona State won the league title and made the CFP after being ranked dead last in the 2024 preseason poll.
Yormark took public support of the CFP moving to a “5+11” model and called for the ACC to stand with him in solidarity. This is, of course, in direct response to the Big Ten moving toward proposing a “4+4+2+2+1+3” (I know it sounds ridiculous) model, which the SEC seems to no longer support either. The model proposed by the Big Ten would give four automatic bids to the Big Ten and SEC, while the ACC and Big 12 would get two apiece. The Big 12 & Co. are lobbying for five auto-bids for the highest-ranked conference champions, and 11 at-large teams. Yormark notably said, “We are not the NFL.”
This is also all under the condition that the playoff expands to 16 teams, which is far from a sure thing. We should probably get a larger sample size under the 12-team model before blowing it up, right?
Yormark also offered high praise for his conference’s on-field product this year, saying he expects multiple Big 12 teams to make the playoff and that they are the “deepest league” in college football. I’m pleading the fifth on speculating on the accuracy of this statement because of Arizona State’s Cinderella run last year.
MACtion Danger?
The MAC might be in trouble. Reports are circulating that the Ohio Bobcats are eyeing a move to the Sun Belt following Texas State’s departure for the new-look Pac-12. These seem to just be preliminary or “feeler” talks from Ohio, and teams like Louisiana Tech and Western Kentucky have already been tied to the Sun Belt.
This comes in the wake of Northern Illinois leaving the MAC in favor of the Mountain West in January, riding the coattails of its win over Notre Dame. However, UMass is set to officially join the conference this year after announcing its move in 2024. Losing MACtion would be a Very Bad casualty in the realignment war.
