A new bipartisan college sports bill introduced to Congress on Wednesday would create new rules around transfers, eligibility, coaching changes and more.
The Protect College Sports Act of 2026, introduced Wednesday by U.S. Senators Ted Cruz and Maria Cantwell, would grant the NCAA a limited antitrust exemption that would allow it to enforce rules around transfers and eligibility without facing challenges from state and local courts. Additionally, the bill seeks to end the practice of college football coaches changing teams before the end of the season and prevent the creation of a Big Ten/SEC super league, while proposing an amendment to the Sports Broadcasting Act of 1961 that would require schools to offer free local broadcasts of football and basketball games if they choose to pool their media rights.
A first look at some of the most notable rules proposed in the Protect College Sports Act:
- Only One Free Transfer: The bill would allow athletes to transfer once without penalty, but would force athletes to sit out a year if they transfer for a second time. Athletes would be allowed to transfer for a second time without penalty, however, if they are a graduate transfer, their head coach leaves for another school, their sport is discontinued at their school or they are a victim of sexual assault or harassment by an individual associated with their team.
- Five-in-Five Eligibility: The bill would allow all college athletes to play five full seasons in their sport within a five-year window that starts the year they graduate high school or their 19th birthday, whichever occurs first. That five-year window would include exemptions for active-duty military service, pregnancy for female athletes, religious missions and “other periods of absence adopted rule or bylaw by an intercollegiate athletic association that apply uniformly to all student athletes.”
- Ineligibility: The bill would allow the NCAA to deem athletes ineligible for using illegal or performance-enhancing drugs or gambling on sports and for a school to deem an athlete ineligible for violating its code of conduct that applies to all students. Athletes who have been paid to play professionally would not be eligible to play college sports, though athletes outside of football and basketball would be able to earn prize money for competing in professional events as long as the prize money is provided only by the sponsor of the event and that sponsor is not connected to an NCAA institution.
- The “Lane Kiffin Rule”: The bill would prevent FBS football coaches from leaving teams before the end of the season to become the coach at another school. Informally dubbed the “Lane Kiffin Rule” in reference to the former Ole Miss coach’s departure to LSU before last year’s College Football Playoff, the legislation would prevent coaches from accepting a job or starting to work for another school before the end of their team’s season; violators of the rule would be ineligible to coach for the following season.
- Salary Cap Enforcement: The bill seeks to close loopholes that allow schools to circumvent the revenue-sharing cap by setting up third-party NIL deals for their athletes through their corporate sponsors. The bill would not prevent third-party NIL deals that meet “a valid business purpose” and are “commensurate with compensation paid to individuals with a similar profile, reputation or notability who are not student athletes or prospective student athletes.” The bill would prohibit conferences that made more than $1 billion in 2025 – aka the Big Ten and SEC – from merging to form a super league separate from the other FBS conferences.
- Pooled Media Rights: As part of a proposed amendment to the Sports Broadcasting Act, the bill proposes an option for FBS schools to pool their media rights collectively if 75% or more of FBS institutions vote in favor of a joint agreement. If schools choose to pool their media rights, they would be required to make their football and basketball games available without charge to viewers on a local outlet in each school’s designated market. No school or conference would be required to pool their media rights, however, and the Big Ten and SEC are likely to oppose pooling media rights to protect their higher revenues relative to other conferences.
- Earlier End to CFP: The amendment to the Sports Broadcasting Act would extend college football’s protected broadcast windows from the first Friday in September to the third Saturday in December – preventing the NFL from playing games on Fridays and Saturdays during those weeks – but stipulates that the College Football Playoff would be required to end no later than Jan. 8.
Wednesday’s introduction of the Protect College Sports Act is only the first step toward enacting Congressional legislation that college sports leaders have long requested to allow them to enforce rules around transfers, eligibility and NIL. The bill will need to be approved by both the Senate and House of Representatives to become law.
Its introduction comes after a vote on the SCORE Act, a Republican-authored bill that was supported by the Big Ten, SEC and other major conferences, was canceled in the House of Representatives. That said, the bipartisan effort to create the Protect College Sports Act could give it a better chance of gaining the support it needs from both Democrats and Republicans to be approved.
Note: In accordance with Eleven Warriors’ commenting policy, we request that all comments refrain from political discussion that does not directly relate to college sports and the proposed legislation.
