Colorado AD Rick George named to NCAA committee on Legislation and NIL

University of Colorado athletic director Rick George has been named to the NCAA’s “Working Group on State and Federal Legislation,” as announced this month.

The committee comprised of 18 members will review recent pieces of state and federal legislation focused on the student-athlete’s “ability to license and benefit from name, image and likeness (NIL) during the period of NCAA eligibility.”

George is one of four Division I athletic director’s chosen as part of the panel, along with Gene Smith (Ohio State), Carla Williams (Virginia), and Jill Bodensteiner (St Joseph’s).

“I am honored to serve on this committee,” George said in a statement. “This is an important conversation to be had and I look forward to getting to work on this with other members of the working group.”

George enters his sixth year as CU’s athletic director with his biggest accomplishment to date being a $156 million Athletic Complex Expansion, overhauling the Dal Ward Center, Folsom Field, and CU’s event center.

With the NCAA’s announcement of the committee on Tuesday, they release a statement saying, “Federal legislation threatens the non-profit status of the Association and its members and state legislation threatens to create local differences that would make it impossible to host fair national championships and to alter materially the principles of intercollegiate athletics. These initiatives necessitate conversations and agreements about how the membership should respond to the legislative proposals.”

“To facilitate the dialogue, the NCAA Board of Governors and the President of the NCAA established the Board of Governors Federal and State Legislation Working Group to study whether the Association should maintain its position in opposition to the legislation and/or work to develop a process whereby a student-athlete’s NIL could be monetized in a fashion that still would be consistent with the NCAA’s core values, mission and principles.”

Specifically, the working group will take up the following:

· Consider whether modifications to NCAA rules, policies and practices should be made to allow for NIL payments.

·Be mindful that NIL payments must not be compensation for athletics participation. Paying students as employees for play is anathema to the NCAA mission focused on students competing against students and is not part of this discussion.

·Assure that any proposed solutions keep in mind that student-athlete benefits must be tethered to educational expenses or incidental to participation.

· Examine whether any modifications to allow for NIL payments, beyond what the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals required in O’Bannon and other court rulings, would be achievable and enforceable without undermining the distinction between professional sports and collegiate sports.

·Preserve the ability to host fair interstate competitions and national championships.

The committee is scheduled to deliver a report to the NCAA Board of Governors on Oct. 29.