The College Sports Commission is conducting longer-term investigations into between five and 10 Power Four programs over potential cap evasion and NIL-related violations, according to CBS Sports. The review covers dealings among institutions, student-athletes and third parties, and multiple programs under scrutiny are described as College Football Playoff contenders.
The CSC is the organization created to oversee athlete compensation following the House Settlement, and it operates the NIL Go platform used to clear name, image and likeness deals for fair-market value. The commission has not named the schools involved, and no program has been charged or disciplined as a result of the investigations.
What The CSC Investigation Covers
The CSC’s inquiries center on whether certain schools and third parties structured NIL deals to evade compensation caps set under the House Settlement framework. The commission reviews deals through NIL Go, and in September alone it cleared $227.25 million in agreements reached between July 1 and Aug. 31 while declining to clear $67.08 million in deals from that same window because they did not meet fair-market-value standards or settlement terms.
Since NIL Go launched, the platform has cleared $582.5 million in deals and denied $156.9 million, per CBS Sports. Those figures show the scale of NIL activity the CSC is tasked with monitoring, though the commission has acknowledged it lacks direct enforcement power under its participation agreements with schools and has run into compliance problems when programs respond slowly or incompletely to information requests.
North Carolina’s Role In The Review
Documents obtained through a public-records request to the University of North Carolina show the school communicated with the CSC regarding its dealings with a third-party NIL company. More than two dozen UNC football and basketball staffers were questioned about their communications with that entity, according to the records.
UNC told the CSC that only basketball general manager Jim Tanner and football general manager Michael Lombardi had contact with the third-party company. Lombardi said he used the company’s software for recruiting purposes, according to the documents cited by CBS Sports.
The records do not identify specific alleged violations tied to UNC beyond the communications with the NIL company, and the school has not been named among the programs facing the broader cap-evasion investigations.
Scope Of The Investigations
The CSC has not publicly identified which five to 10 Power Four programs are under investigation, nor has it detailed specific alleged violations beyond the general categories of cap evasion and NIL-related rule breaking. No timeline has been given for when the investigations began or when findings might be issued, and no school has faced a charge or penalty tied to this round of inquiries.
What’s Next
The CSC’s enforcement limitations under its current participation agreements mean any findings from these investigations could depend on cooperation from the schools themselves. No hearing dates or decision timelines have been announced. The commission’s NIL Go clearance process continues to operate alongside the investigations, with monthly deal totals offering the clearest public signal of market activity while the review proceeds.
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