President Donald Trump hosted a college sports roundtable Friday to examine solutions to key challenges, including NCAA authority; name, image and likeness (NIL) issues; collective bargaining; and governance concerns. Athletic officials in attendance included NCAA President Charlie Baker, former Alabama head football coach Nick Saban, OutKick founder Clay Travis, New York Yankees President Randy Levine and each of the Power Four commissioners, among others.”This is the future, I think, beyond college sports. This is the future of colleges,” Trump said to kick off the roundtable. “The amount of money being spent and lost by otherwise very successful schools is astounding just in a short period of time. It’s only going to get worse. We have to save college sports, and, I believe, colleges.CLICK HERE FOR MORE SPORTS COVERAGE ON FOXNEWS.COM “Crazy things are happening. … We have a seven-year freshman. We’re seeing things we’ve never seen before. College players not wanting to go pro because they make more money in college,” he added.Trump said there has been an “inability to set rules,” noting that different states have different NIL laws, prompting another challenge for college sports.”If Congress doesn’t take action fast, it could destroy college sports,” Trump said.Trump ripped “one judge who knew nothing about sports, knew nothing about football, knew nothing about Olympics, knew nothing about anything, just decided everything was unconstitutional.” He was likely referring to Judge Claudia Wilken, who ruled in 2019 that the NCAA’s limits on education-related benefits violated antitrust law.”It’s crazy. Only Congress can deliver a permanent fix,” Trump said.Trump noted he was not aiming to revert to athletes not being paid.”Although, not the worst idea,” he admitted. “But I think a lot of people would overrule me on that.”Later on, Trump said he wanted to “just go back to what you had, let some judge tell you can’t do it, you appeal, and you win at some point. Because what you had — what a great system. Everybody was happy.”Saban said helping athletes become more successful on a personal level has become “impossible” in today’s era.”People, instead of making decisions about creating value for their future, they were making decisions about how much money could they make at whichever school they can go to or transfer to,” Saban said. “I think we need to come up with a system, and, obviously, we have to do it with the president’s leadership and also with Congress probably … to allow student-athletes in all sports to enhance their quality of life while going to college but still provide opportunity to advance themselves beyond their athletic career, which is what the philosophy of college athletes and getting a college education has always been about.”Trump has been adamant about “saving college sports,” even signing an executive order setting new restrictions on payments to college athletes in July.The president’s order prohibits athlet
Trump sets sights on NIL regulation, SCORE Act at college sports roundtable, teases another executive order
