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The Presidential College Sports Reform Committee (a group formed by President Donald Trump in early 2026 to fix what he called the “broken” system of college athletics) believes the current college sports system is in a state of “degradation and destruction.” So, according to Ross Dellenger of Yahoo, the committee wants to team up with Congress to get a limited antitrust exemption so they can set strict rules without getting sued. The goal is to stop the chaos of every state having its own laws and get everyone onto one single playbook.

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Earlier today, Dellenger revealed the documented details of a three-phase “Roadmap” to dismantle the current NCAA-led system and replace it with a federally protected governing structure. To start, they want to create a two-year “Task Force” (overseen by Congress) to act as a temporary boss and see their three-phase plan.

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Phase 1: Implementation of the Task Force and its objectives

The first phase is an “emergency mode” designed to freeze the current financial bleeding before the system collapses or spirals any further than it is already. The committee is calling for a “College Reform Task Force” to be established under the existing NCAA, but with a power upgrade: federal legislation that provides limited antitrust protection and preemption of state laws.

This is critical because it allows the Task Force to immediately implement “prescriptive” rules that would otherwise be illegal, specifically hard salary caps for coaches and administrators and the total elimination of “salary cap circumvention” via Booster Collectives.

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Schools now face a $20.5 million revenue-sharing mandate to pay players directly. You cannot hand a head coach $10 million while legally required athlete payouts drain the budget. This federal intervention forces the system to cap coaching salaries for the sport’s survival. They want to put a lid on these massive salaries to make sure the money is actually being spread around to save all the other sports on campus. The exact number is yet to be revealed.

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To stop the roster chaos, they plan to regulate the transfer portal and introduce a “Bird Rule” (similar to the NBA), which gives athletes financial or eligibility incentives to remain at their current school. This phase also focuses on “re-direction” of department revenues, ensuring money from apparel contracts and media rights stays within the regulated system rather than being siphoned off.

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Phase 2: Revenue Enhancement and Commercial Evolution

Once the legal drama is settled, the Task Force starts looking at Media Rights Pooling. The idea is that if 75+ schools opt in, they can bundle their TV rights together and play hardball with the big networks for way more money. They know this won’t happen overnight since some conferences, like the ACC, are locked in until 2036. So they’re viewing it as a slow-burn evolution.

They also want to get smart about scheduling. Right now, non-football athletes are flying across the country for random mid-week games, which is expensive and exhausting. This phase sort of aims to fix those travel costs, explore a G6-specific playoff for the smaller schools, and find new ways to squeeze more profit out of events like March Madness to keep the whole ecosystem alive and profitable for as much as possible.

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Phase 3: The new dawn of college football

The final phase is the “grand finale,” where the interim Task Force is replaced by a Permanent Governing Body, basically ending the NCAA’s old-school era for good, once and for all. This new ‘super-board’ will have 15 members, including the Power Conference commissioners, a specific seat for Notre Dame, student-athlete reps, and independent attorneys.

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This body will operate like a professional sports league office, with the authority to appoint commissioners. They plan to lobby for updates to the Sports Broadcasting Act of 1961, maximizing revenue from media rights deals.

So, by the time this phase is done, two years down the line, the college sports will be a fully-regulated, federally backed, billion-dollar business that operates a lot more like any other professional league in America rather than a collection of independent schools.

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Ameek Abdullah Jamal

2,268 Articles

Ameek Abdullah Jamal is a College Football writer at EssentiallySports. An athlete-turned-writer, he brings on-field perspective to his coverage, highlighting the energy, rivalries, and culture that define campus football. His reporting emphasizes quick-turn updates and nuanced storytelling, connecting directly with engaged fans.

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Himanga Mahanta

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