If college sports are dead, I guess I was watching ghosts last night dressed in UK baseball uniforms beat ghosts dressed in Tennessee uniforms. That'd make for an interesting spooky cartoon short from 1939.
SCOTUS ruled 9-0 against the NCAA on the basis of NIL so besides a minor tweak here and there (which likely won't be made because the NCAA has chosen to stand on the side of the road like they're waiting for a bus) NIL isn't going to change. Money rules the world and it's already bought championship teams in every sport for decades. Let's not pretend this has ever been Hoosiers with it's midwestern charm.
As far as scholarships go, they've always been a one year contract. Locking an athlete into a four year contract is so out of touch with reality that it's hilarious.
Some are now doing to college basketball what they do with life. "Life was so much better and wholesome and this and that when I was young." Really? Was it? Was every town Pleasantville and did no one ever lock their doors at night? That's a nostalgic fantasy. It's Mayberry.
What's happening isn't perfect by a longshot but when you begin the topic with "College sports are dead." then I'm going to laugh because they're certainly not and those who believe that will likely be here a decade from now saying the same damn thing. And the players are criticized a lot. But it's hard to imagine the pressure because you need to practice a lot, and also you have to study. And combining it can be hard. Of course, nowadays, there are a lot of useful resources that help, but still, I don't play sports. I still have lack of time sometimes, so I use a lot of extra resources. This page
https://papersowl.com/blog/opinion-essay-topics always helps me when I have difficulties with topics for opinion essays and those ideas are amazing. And it actually saves me some time, which I can dedicate to something else. So, I can only imagine how hard it all is for student athletes.