BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — Collegiate athletics is not broken, according to Greg Sankey, but the SEC commissioner makes it very clear there glaring issues that must be addressed.
“Broken is a simple term for a complex set of circumstances, that’s why I think you have to look at the issues and address those individually,” Sankey said last week while speaking at the Associated Press Sports Editors Southeast Region meeting at the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame.
“In my view, if we could have clarity on eligibility and transfer oversight, those two things would help improve and address some of the problems that have a ripple effect.”
The 61-year-old Sankey, on the verge of his 12th year serving as the league’s commissioner, was visibility frustrated at times when asked for solutions that might solve the fluid issues that have arisen in the infancy of the transfer portal and NIL era.
National standards
“We need national standards,” Sankey said. “There’s plenty of good happening here, but what’s happened, (is) state-by-state legislation. … Running a national championship system on a state-by-state regulatory basis just doesn’t work, and you’re seeing that in real time.”
Indeed, there’s no consistency in how collegiate sports are governed from state to state, or in the various courtrooms fielding cases dealing with player eligibility or NIL dealings.
It’s fair for football fans to wonder at surface value why Ole Miss quarterback Trinidad Chambliss was granted an extra year of eligibility by a judge in Mississippi — via court injunction — while a judge in Tennessee denied the request of Vols quarterback Joey Aguilar to play another season.
But Sankey pointed out there are obvious issues that provide evidence of a system that has strayed from the collegiate sports mission.
“A 28-year-old freshman being recruited from some international location after how many years in a club sport in a club setting, that’s not about the college-going experience,” Sankey said, perhaps referring to a Jamaican player at Faulkner State who played as a 28- and 29-year-old.
“Five or six transfers, a ninth year of eligibility, those things need to be addressed.”
Conflict of interest?
Sankey explained why he doesn’t feel any more conflict representing the SEC on national issues now than he did before the league’s recent three-year College Football Playoff championship dry spell.
“You predicate that (dry spell) has somehow changed my view. … I certainly do work for the Southeastern Conference,” Sankey said when the question was posed by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution in the question-and-answer forum.
“If I have a conflict of interest, it’s literally on my sleeve.”
Sankey said better to be wary of others, including outside firms, who are working to become a part of the collegiate athletics system.
“There are plenty of other ideas out there coming from both inside and outside where those conflicts of interests aren’t divulged,” Sankey said, referring to the growing influence of private equity funds in athletic department funding in places like Utah, Clemson and Kentucky.
“Some of these outside firms that say ‘Hey we’re going to come with a solution’ don’t divulge what’s in it for them — they’re not charities. Private capital, private equities, are not charities.”
Playoff expansion
Sankey points out that he has supported the expansion of both football and basketball postseason fields even when the SEC did not have a need for either actions to take place.
“You’re not asking me if we go back to four (teams) in the playoff — if it was only about the SEC, we did not need the growth in the playoff (field),” said Sankey, who has been a recent proponent of the current CFP field size growing to 16 teams.
“I still think that’s true, we would have had teams in it. Maybe we wouldn’t have had two teams in, like we’ve led with, but we’ve always had teams in. We’re the only conference that’s always had team in the top four (dating back to the four-team CFP field).
Sankey essentially shrugged off the lack of an SEC football champion since Georgia won the second of back-to-back titles following the 2022 season.
“We’ve had some tough losses: ball’s in the air, coming to the end zone, didn’t complete the pass. That’s the thin margins that exist,” Sankey said.
“You compare that to the (2022) Peach Bowl as the ball drops in Times Square, and the field goal goes to the left for Ohio State, and we (SEC member Georgia) win. That’s how close the margins are,” he said.
“The proximity of the difference between winning and losing doesn’t alter my view or my values, which is I’m going to represent for the SEC, but that doesn’t mean it’s in conflict with what’s in the interest of the big picture.”
More recently, Sankey supported the NCAA’s recent decision to expand the men’s and women’s basketball tournament fields growing from 68 to 76 teams.
“We didn’t need it. We had 14 teams in the 68-team field a year ago (and) we were at 10 last year with two just out,” Sankey said. “I’d love to have the two in. We could make the case the two deserved to be in the (field of) 68.
“But I think (field expansion) takes pressure off automatic bids, where there’s a greater disparity between the last teams in under that system and those left out, and the top 45 or so. I think that can be good in the big picture, but it’s not like we have to have it.”
NCAA obligations
Sankey also expressed level of frustration with the NCAA’s ability to enforce rules amid this current landscape.
“We’ve entrusted certain things, like managing eligibility rules,” Sankey said “The threats from years ago that the NCAA enforcement staff is going to get after tampering, then it goes for two or three years and you don’t really see anything. … It’s the same thing with preenrollment NIL.”
Sankey said there’s been a lack of progression and clarity in eligibility issues, with more talk than action.
“Talking about different directions versus effectively researching, developing, considering and implementing effective policies is two different situations,” Sankey said.
“I do think the environment and the frustration around those (eligibility) boundaries has driven more attention and more effort to have those improved policies, but they’re not in place yet.”
A good start, Sankey said, is to define exactly where the point of enforceable violations exist — specifically with tampering.
“When I walked in this (SEC) office in November of 2002, it was bumps in the hallway of a high school because you had your coaching shirt on, that was tampering,” Sankey said. “Now you have agents, quasi-agents, people who call themselves agents, aunts, uncles, neighbors, who insert themselves into the process. …
“One of the things that needs to happen is there needs to be a redefinition of tampering.”
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