Notre Dame implores Congress to save ‘great American institution’ after ‘undesirable’ $2.8B NCAA settlement

Notre Dame had its statement ready in the wake of a bombshell NCAA settlement, and it wasn’t vague on its stance about potential athlete compensation.

On Thursday, the NCAA and the nation’s five biggest conferences came to an agreement to pay almost $2.8 billion to settle several antitrust claims.

It’s an agreement — which still needs a federal judge’s approval — that, in Notre Dame’s opinion, put the “great American institution of college sports” in jeopardy, as the ruling could potentially see millions being distributed to athletes’ pockets in a revenue-sharing plan directly from colleges.

“The settlement, though undesirable in many respects and promising only temporary stability, is necessary to avoid what would be the bankruptcy of college athletics,” said the university’s president Rev. John I. Jenkins, C.S.C in a statement. “To save the great American institution of college sports, Congress must pass legislation that will preempt the current patchwork of state laws; establish that our athletes are not employees, but students seeking college degrees; and provide protection from further anti-trust lawsuits that will allow colleges to make and enforce rules that will protect our student-athletes and help ensure competitive equity among our teams.”

The $2.8 billion settlement will be paid over 10 years to more than 14,000 former and current college athletes, who have said that now-defunct rules have prohibited them from earning an income from endorsement and sponsorship deals going back as far as 2016.

The decision will create a professional sports-like compensation system that brings about a revenue-sharing fund that will allow schools to share as much as $22 million a year to their athletes.

Questions still remain around the deal, including how this will affect Notre Dame and their independence from NCAA conferences.

“Even though it was only because of the overwhelming legal pressure, the NCAA, conferences and schools are agreeing that college athletes should be paid,” said former UCLA football player Ramogi Huma, according to the Associated Press. “And there’s no going back from there.

“That’s truly groundbreaking.”

— With AP