NCAA To Vote on Autonomy for Power Conferences on August 7th

The wheels are turning and Power Conference autonomy could be coming in just three weeks. The restructuring of the Division I governance board is expected to give the five power conferences the ability to set and govern themselves with rules apart from the traditional NCAA structure. The Division I steering committee agreed to allow the Atlantic Coast, Big Ten, Big 12 , Pacific 12 and Southeastern conferences until October 1 to put together their first proposals that would be considered and possibly adopted when the five conferences conduct a business session at the 2015 NCAA Convention.

“We are not deaf to the din of discontent across intercollegiate athletics that has dominated the news,” said Mike Slive, SEC Commissioner. “We have created the initiative to restructure the NCAA, in accordance with our vision for the 21st century with the support of student-athletes at it’s core … This is not a new effort on our part. The SEC’s call for change was introduced at Media Days in 2011, and will continue until we’ve realized our desired outcomes. Over the last year, we, along with our colleagues at the ACC, Big 10, Big 12 and PAC 12, developed this new vision for intercollegiate athletics for the 21st century. The vision includes the NCAA’s enactment of a governance system that will provide greater autonomy for the SEC and the other four conferences for the benefit of student athletes.”

Basically what Slive and Ohio State AD Gene Smith are saying is that its gotten awful crowded in FBS football and it's time for everyone to recognize the split which does exist in the division.

You might ask why the rest of the schools would go for a plan which, inherently, knocks everyone else down a peg. The answer is simple: If the Power Five doesn't get their way, they're likely to leave the NCAA and do their own thing. That would mean the Golden Goose of the NCAA, March Madness, would go away.

What this means for video games' future is simple: at the very least the Power Five conferences could have rules in place to compensate players legally for their appearances in publicity material, products, and media very soon. It still remains unlikely we will see a college football game officially announced anywhere until next Summer at the very earliest -- but the legal structures for such a product to exist could certainly be in place soon.