Pac-12 passes sweeping new rule changes on scholarships, transfers

The Pac-12 Conference has passed a set of new rules for its athletes concerning scholarships, athlete transfers and more under the new autonomy granted by the NCAA.

Several of the major changes are similar to those proposed by the Big Ten earlier this month. Among them are guaranteeing athlete scholarships for four years and improving health insurance for student athletes.

The Pac-12 is among the 5 major football conferences (ACC, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-12 and SEC) given autonomy by the NCAA to set many of their own rules.

The Big Ten implemented some changes of its own early this month, and sent a list of recommendations on to the NCAA. You can read our report on those proposals here.

Here’s a quick look at a couple of the major changes within the Pac-12. Most of the rules will go into effect beginning with the 2015-2016 season:

Guaranteeing scholarships for four years

The Big Ten announced in early October that it would become the first conference to guarantee athlete scholarships for four years. The Pac-12 followed suit this week.

Typically, athlete scholarships are drawn up as 1-year contracts, meaning the school can alter the scholarship amounts or pull the financial support altogether from year to year. The new wave within college sports seems to be schools and conferences treating scholarships as 4-year deals, which can’t be altered as long as the athlete stays in good standing with the program.

Among the Big Ten proposals to the NCAA was guaranteeing scholarships “for life” – meaning that if an athlete left the school for a legitimate reason prior to graduating, he or she would be able to return to school and finish out their degree later on in life with the same financial support.

The Pac-12 will implement its own version of that rule, with a stipulation that an athlete must complete half of their degree before leaving to be guaranteed their financial aid when they return.

Student-athlete health insurance

This is a more hot-button issue in highly injury-prone sports like football or basketball, but still has an impact on the sport of swimming. The Pac-12 will now require its schools to cover medical expenses for athletically-related injuries in its athletes.

This was also among the Big Ten proposals. New in the Pac-12 rules, though, is that schools will actually be required to take care of their athletes well after graduation: the conference has set a 4-year-window after an athlete graduates where injuries related to their college sport-playing days will be covered by the school.

Loosening transfer rules relating to scholarships

The other major change the Pac-12 has made is allowing athletes to transfer to a different school within the conference and still receive a scholarship. Most major conferences won’t allow an athlete to earn a scholarship at a new school after transferring within the conference. The changes knock out that rule within the Pac-12.

An important note: this does not change the 1-year sit-out rule. Athletes who transfer without a release from their former program will still have to sit out one year of competition before joining their new team. That rule comes down from the NCAA, and would need to be changed on the national level. (It’s also possible the NCAA could allow the Big 5 conferences to change that rule themselves given their new autonomy, though it remains to be seen exactly what that new autonomy means for the conferences in cases like this.)

Pac-12 commissioner Larry Scott did tell CBSSports that the 1-year sit-out rule is “something we believe should be discussed,” but said the conference is going to see what happens on a national scale first. “We are encouraging a national discussion about those transfer rules.”

The Pac-12 changes also include more athlete representation and input at conference meetings. Getting athletes more involved in the governance of college sports has been a big rallying cry from those supporting increased benefits for athletes, and this is a move that seems to be happening more and more in various forms across the NCAA.

The conference hasn’t yet decided if it will give student-athletes a vote on conference issues or how that vote will be organized. According to CBSSports, options include adding a 4th vote to each member school (currently each school gets a vote from an athletic director, a senior administrator and a faculty rep) or creating a separate vote to represent all student-athletes of the conference.

In terms of swimming, these rules could turn out to have some high-profile impacts on swimming, even if they will probably affects more athletes in sports like football and basketball. That’s because some of the bigger swimming stars of the U.S. National Team are either in the Pac-12 or have committed there, including the two biggest names in American women’s swimming right now, Missy Franklin (Cal) and Katie Ledecky (Stanford).

Franklin, now a sophomore at Cal, seemed originally set on swimming two college seasons before turning pro heading into the Rio Olympics. The rules that would have her scholarship waiting for her after going pro might be coming just too late. CBSSports reports that the conference plans to start that rule with the 2016-2017 season. It could turn out to be in play for Ledecky, though, who could conceivably swim two years at Stanford starting next fall, complete the half of her degree required, turn pro and then come back to finish her schooling with the same athletic scholarship.

There are a lot of moving pieces in those scenarios, including when Ledecky decides to start her college eligibility. Probably most unpredictable are the further rule changes that the Pac-12, the Big 5 conferences and the NCAA will implement over the next few years. Given the major ways the landscape has changed already, it’s a near-certainty that more big upheavals are in store for college athletics.