DESTIN, Fla. (AP) — Southeastern Conference football coaches are bracing for the impact of a possible NCAA downsizing.
Coaches gathered Tuesday for the league’s spring meetings with potential roster issues among the issues on their minds following a settlement agreement involving the NCAA and the five largest conferences. How does that finally breaks loose won’t be clear for months, but Texas A&M coach Mike Elko was particularly adamant against the prospect of limiting football rosters to just 85 players.
Elko argued that an 85-player limit, which would essentially eliminate unqualified players, would be “something really bad for the sport.”
“I’m firmly against it,” the Aggies’ first-year coach said. “I think it’s absolutely against college football and what it stands for and what it’s about.”
Scholarship Limits The limit could be lifted in some sports, but even the wealthiest schools will have to make choices when it comes to fully or even partially funding their athletic programs. Currently, Bowl Subdivision football programs are allowed to award 85 full scholarships, but with the potential for additional spending, there is speculation that some sort of cap could help in terms of competitive balance – perhaps at the risk of more of disputes.
That means roster size is a hot topic for football coaches across the country, although it’s far from the most important with direct payments from schools to players on the table if a federal judge approves this settlement of nearly $2.8 billion.
SEC Commissioner Greg Sankey said his advice when hearing from league coaches in recent weeks was to slow down.
“I know other conferences have discussed this. Then the coaches sent messages to our coaches. They got excited,” Sankey said. “And we said, wait a minute. We’re going to have a conversation. That’s where it happens. It’s a concept. »
It was just one topic as coaches, presidents, athletic directors and other officials gathered for three days of meetings with so much pending within college athletics, from realignment to remuneration and transfers of athletes.
“There are so many things happening right now. There’s not one thing that’s dominant,” Georgia coach Kirby Smart said. “It is probably, in the nine years that I have been participating in this meeting, the most anticipated because there are so many things to decide, but on which we can have our say. Some of them are beyond our decision-making power. So there is a lot to do. »
Smart noted that he doesn’t “know anyone who would be against having witnesses.” He pointed out that coaches like Clemson’s Dabo Swinney and former Florida and South Carolina coach Will Muschamp were college replacements.
A handful of coaches are concerned about the future of non-scholarship players and the potential changes to practices if they have fewer players. Texas coach Steve Sarkisian, who is preparing for the Longhorns’ first season in the SEC, doesn’t want to lose those non-scholarship players. His son, Brady, is among the Longhorns’ 35 non-scholarship players.
“I hope we can find common ground on a reasonable number,” Sarkisian said. “Change is going to happen. But I hope we can find a reasonable number that will allow us to continue to operate at a high level as coaches and for our players. »
New Alabama coach Kalen DeBoer publicly took a more fluid approach than his outspoken predecessor, Nick Saban, even if it ultimately meant adjusting to an 85-man roster.
“There’s always a solution,” DeBoer said. “Would that be a very different approach to what we do as coaches and in terms of executing our training plans? Absolutely. But I guess I’ve always been one to adapt to the times and do what you have to do. »
Vanderbilt coach Clark Lea also isn’t ready to get excited, as Sankey says, about any changes in roster size on the horizon.
“What I’ve heard is that everything I’ve heard is not trustworthy,” Lea said. “All of this needs to be determined. I want to know a little bit more about all of this. I think talking about it now or sharing an opinion now is irresponsible. I want to know more about everything that’s going on before I form an opinion. … There’s a lot of speculation out there right now that I’m not really paying attention to.”
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