Tennessee Tech’s Assistant Athletic Director of Compliance Mandy Thatcher said more lawsuits could follow after the U.S. Department of Education decision that Title IX would not apply to NIL deals.
Thatcher said a current lawsuit settlement includes $20.5 million in funding for student athletes, though a judge has not finalized the agreement. Thatcher said with the pot of NIL money coming from the universities there is a case that revenue sharing could fall under financial aid which is covered under Title IX.
“The Department of Education and federal financial aid legislation is gonna have to be able to differentiate student-athletes from regular students if they want to keep that same legislation,” Thatcher said. “Because student-athletes are not considered employees of universities, so we can’t write them an employment check and treat it as that NIL money.”
Many universities are planning to distribute over the majority of the $20.5 million to their revenue-leading sports, such as football and men’s basketball. Thatcher said with Title IX not applying to NIL money, many student-athletes could file lawsuits. The payments may also cause issues with athletic budgets.
“Money changes everything,” Thatcher said. “I think we will lose sports both on the men’s and women’s side. I think there will be a big reduction in the amount of sports offered at institutions and that’s what administrations will have to look to evaluate.”
Thatcher said the ruling with how Title IX would affect universities flipping, it has made it difficult for universities to budget for the upcoming school year. Thatcher said universities could have different strategies about how they move forward with the NIL money.
“Maybe playing it cautious but I don’t know,” Thatcher said. “I think the plan in general was for larger institutions like Ohio State, like the University of Tennessee to focus those distributions on their male revenue-producing sports.”
