Next week, Judge Claudia Wilken will hear arguments regarding the landmark House v. NCAA settlement. The hearing could transform the college sports landscape with roster limits and revenue-sharing with a $20.5 million cap.
April 7 has long been circled as a potentially transformative day. However, Georgia coach Kirby Smart issued a strong warning about the settlement’s impact – and he cited current tampering issues as a reason for his argument.
Smart noted the current state of the college basketball transfer portal window with names entering and dollars flying. When it comes to college football, he called on people to take a “deep breath” because of the amount of unknowns with the House settlement. But Smart doesn’t plan on changing his approach to recruiting.
“I think everybody’s got to take a big pause right now and say, ‘Deep breath,’ because what’s going on in basketball right now is crazy,” Smart told reporters Tuesday. “We don’t know everything that’s going to come out with April 7 – which might be April 7, might be the settlement date where we get a lot more information. But everybody’s on pins and needles because we don’t know exactly what’s going to come out of this.
“What I do know is we’re going to continue to recruit people who love football, who are passionate about football and don’t put money as the No. 1 answer. Like, I’ve never met a really good player that that’s all they care about. The 105 number, the NIL number, ‘What’s the cap number? What is this going to be?’”
The first college football transfer window opened after the final College Football Playoff rankings reveal in December. But the second one opens for one week in the spring – April 16-25. Ahead of that span, Smart said some are already shopping around.
“There’s stuff going on right now, guys, in college football – there’s people reaching out to have a Zoom call and present all the players they represent that are on teams, including our teams,” Smart said. “And they want to invite people to the Zooms so they can watch and see who’s going in the portal or shopping who’s in the portal before the portal. ‘Do you want to get on a Zoom and look at all these players?’ What if some of them are mine?”
