that school isn't surviving and/or competing in any given sport. From a business standpoint it makes cents (I said it that way for a reason) that the media outlets would want to funnel as much money as possible towards the P2. Even if the politicians and fans want more schools included in the highest level of college athletics, the limitation may take care of itself naturally because the schools decide that every collegiate athlete should be paid a base salary. I believe very few schools are in a financial position to handle that additional cost particularly if the schools are expected to maintain the current number of sponsored sports to satisfy Title IX and any labor related requirements. There may even be some current P2 schools who can't handle the additional financial burden for various reasons which would force them to leave their P2 conference. Right now it looks like we could see paid athletes compete against non-paid athletes at the DI level. It is likely there will come a day when the schools with the non-paid athletes will no longer want to compete against the schools with paid athletes because they think they are at a competitive disadvantage. The concept isn't a new one for the DI schools. Remember up until 1991 the bylaws were structured so DI schools could compete at the DII or DIII level in a sport. The bylaw was primarily used so DI schools could compete at the DIII level in football to avoid being required to offer athletic scholarships in the sport. Eventually enough DIII schools thought the DI schools had an unfair competitive advantage in football because the program had access to the DI resources that the DIII schools did not. Notice the perceived competitive advantage had nothing to do with the actual results on the football field. As a result, the DI bylaws were modified to eliminate that option and created the ability for schools to compete in non-scholarship or limited scholarship at the DI-FCS level. The Pioneer Football League (PFL) was created as a non-scholarship DI-FCS football only conference. The Patriot League opted to switch to non-scholarship DI-FCS football too as a result of the change in the bylaws. The PFL is still a non-scholarship conference and in 2013 the Patriot League allowed schools to offer limited scholarships for football (equivalent of 15 scholarships). This will likely be the other major factor that limits how many schools compete at the highest level in a given sport. Also, this factor may be the easier one to sell to justify having the schools with paid athletes do their own thing. While the remaining schools (i.e. ACC, AAC, Big XII, C-USA, MWC, MAC, FCS conferences, DII, and DIII) re-organize themselves to a structure similar to what we have now. If the schools with paid athletes are still under the NCAA umbrella, then we could see 4 division levels instead of 3. new DI = the schools with paid athletes new DII = the remaining DI-FBS schools, DI-FCS schools, and DI non-football schools new DIII = the old DII new DIV = the old DIII It is possible there could be more than 4 division levels if the schools want to reduce the numbers for each division level into a more manageable number. Hence why I said at the beginning the schools (new DII, new DIII, and new DIV) could still be surviving and competing even if they are no longer a new DI school because DI-FCS, DII, and DIII are currently doing it now. It just means they may not be getting as much exposure as fans were used to in the past. IIWII when humans live in a world where the only constant is change. ** Edited by VTHokie2000 at 1/4/2024, 10:07:46 AM