NCAA to vote on altering eligibility rules

Over the last handful of years, the lines surrounding the eligibility rules in college sports have gotten extremely blurred. Courts challenge many NCAA rulings, medical redshirts and other waivers have been handed out like miniature Kit-Kats on Halloween, and everything about the post-COVID/NIL/transfer portal era has only added to the confusion. Frankly, in many ways, the eligibility crisis in college sports is out of control.

However, the NCAA hopes to put a much tighter leash on this beast soon.

According to a Friday announcement from the Division-I Cabinet, voting on some significant rule changes could be coming this summer. The cabinet revealed that they could be voting on an “age-based eligibility model” when they meet again in June.

For a vote to happen, the age-based eligibility model would have to be officially proposed. However, that is the current expectation.

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This age-based model would be much simpler than the current system, which loosely follows written guidelines and relies on many subjective factors and other judgment calls. Some talks about this model have labeled it the “5-for-5 model.” The “5-for-5” represents five years for an athlete to play five seasons.

In this model, a student-athlete’s five-year eligibility clock begins the academic year after high school graduation or the 19th birthday. That means that players will have five years of college eligibility following their graduation from high school, whether they are early enrollees, summer enrollees, or fall enrollees.

Redshirts, medical waivers, academic pauses, and other years off in traditional collegiate athletics would become a thing of the past. Some exceptions would exist. The cabinet’s announcement listed pregnancy/maternity leave, religious missions, and military service as possible waiver-eligible situations. In this model, all sports would share eligibility rules, something that was not the case in the modern redshirt culture.

In theory, this new model would nearly eliminate the large groups of older athletes who have participated in NCAA-sanctioned sports in recent years.

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The NCAA’s potential upcoming vote could see the age-based eligibility model come into effect this fall.

Pending how the cabinet formally proposes and accepts the potential rule change, players already enrolled in college sports with eligibility beyond 2026 will have the benefit of receiving a fifth year. Players with existing approved eligibility for a sixth year or beyond would also not lose that eligibility. Schools and athletic programs would have the flexibility to handle those scholarship decisions internally.

If approved, the age-based model would go into effect for any player who graduates in spring of 2026 or beyond.

Programs may still petition for waiver requests under the old system through July 31 of this year.

It is worth noting that the NCAA’s release mentions eligibility “within [an athlete’s] chosen sport.” It is unclear how eligibility might shift for multi-sport athletes who change sports while in college.

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