BYU-I Sports

The SCORE Act—formally the Student Compensation and Opportunity through Rights and Endorsements Act—is the latest congressional attempt to bring order to the rapidly shifting world of college athletics. While its final shape is still uncertain, the bill has already advanced through House committees and represents the clearest picture yet of how federal lawmakers might regulate athlete compensation, NIL (name, image, and likeness) rights, and athletic department funding.

At its core, the SCORE Act seeks to balance three competing priorities:

1. Protecting athletes with uniform rules and guaranteed benefits.
2. Providing legal and financial safeguards for the NCAA and its member schools.
3. Preserving Olympic, women’s, and non-revenue sports in the face of mounting costs.

Evolution of the Bill

When the bill was first introduced in July 2025, it emphasized limits on funding sources and minimum team requirements. Schools with any coach earning over $250,000 would be required to sponsor at least 16 varsity sports. At the same time, the bill would prohibit schools from using student fees to subsidize athletics—a direct response to recent moves at places like Clemson and Fresno State, where students were charged new fees to cover revenue-sharing obligations.

As the legislation moved through committees, the language shifted toward NIL standardization, athlete protections, and antitrust safeguards for the NCAA. The current version would override state NIL laws, create a national standard, regulate agent fees, and require contracts to have a “valid business purpose.” It would also prevent athletes from being classified as employees, a red line for both the NCAA and most lawmakers.

What It Would Mean in Practice

If enacted, the SCORE Act would establish a uniform NIL system across all 50 states. Athletes would gain consistent protections—scholarships that cannot be revoked for injury or performance, several years of post-eligibility medical coverage, and guaranteed academic support. At the same time, institutions would gain limited antitrust protection, shielding them from certain lawsuits so long as they follow SCORE provisions.

The bill also tries to safeguard non-revenue sports. The 16-sport rule tied to high coach salaries is designed to prevent schools from eliminating Olympic or women’s programs to free up money for football and men’s basketball. However, critics argue that the student-fee ban will still push smaller schools to cut teams if they can’t raise revenue elsewhere.

Political Reality

Passage in the House looks possible, given its bipartisan co-sponsors and broad NCAA support. But the Senate is another matter. Democrats are backing the competing SAFE Act, which emphasizes broadcast-rights pooling, mandatory coverage of women’s and Olympic sports, and stronger athlete benefits. The philosophical divide—Republicans prioritizing stability and liability protection, Democrats prioritizing athlete welfare and equity—makes compromise difficult.

Why It Matters for BYU–Idaho

For schools like BYU–Idaho, which do not currently sponsor intercollegiate athletics, the SCORE Act has indirect but important implications. If passed, it would harden the financial lines of college sports. On one hand, the student-fee ban makes it harder for smaller schools to launch or relaunch athletic programs, since student contributions have often been a bridge to sustainability. On the other, the 16-sport mandate and protections for Olympic sports suggest that any future return to varsity athletics at BYU–Idaho would have to be built on a broad base of offerings—not just basketball or football.

In short, the SCORE Act reinforces the idea that college athletics must serve the many, not just the few. If intercollegiate sports ever return to Rexburg, they will do so in a regulatory environment where compliance, sustainability, and equity matter as much as competition. For BYU–Idaho, that could be both a challenge and an opportunity.