The Pac-12 Conference, which will drop down to two members this summer, will no longer be an “autonomous conference,” the NCAA Division I Board of Directors determined on Monday, effective Aug. 2. It will instead be classified as a “nonautonomous FBS conference” like the Group of 5.

The board created new governance thresholds for conferences that fall below membership requirements. As a result, the Pac-12 will lose representation on the Board of Directors. It will retain representation and voting rights on the Division I Council, the Football Oversight Committee and the Division I Student-Athlete Advisory Committee when applicable, but the weight of its Council vote will be diminished.

Multi-sport conferences are required to have at least eight members, but in the event they drop below that number, they are allowed a two-year grace period to get back up. The Pac-12 will lose 10 schools to the Big Ten, Big 12 and ACC this summer, leaving only Oregon State and Washington State. The board’s determinations on Monday apply to conferences in that grace period.

In 2014, the board created a new “autonomy” model, granting the ACC, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-12 and SEC the ability to make some of their own rules together, which happened the next year with full cost-of-attendance…

Of course, you know the calls. Verne Lundquist provided the soundtrack for so many iconic sports moments, from Jack Nicklaus’ 17th-hole birdie putt at the 1986 Masters (“Yes, sir!”) to Christian Laettner’s jumper at the buzzer in the 1992 NCAA Tournament (“Yes!”) to Tiger Woods’ famed chip at No. 16 at the 2005 Masters (“In your life, have you seen anything like that?!”) to Auburn’s kick-six in the 2013 Iron Bowl (“An answered prayer!”). So many more, too.

But here is something you may not know: On the night of Nov. 22, 1963, Lundquist was just a 23-year-old weekend sportscaster on television and afternoon disc jockey at KTBC-AM-FM-TV, an Austin, Texas, radio-television station owned by Lyndon Johnson and his wife, Lady Bird. That evening, he volunteered to drive CBS News correspondent David Schoumacher and two other CBS staffers the 60 miles from Austin to Johnson City so they could interview friends, relatives and high school classmates of Johnson, who would soon become President of the United States. He never forgot that night. How could you?

But my favorite Verne story is how he met his wife, Nancy. It’s one he told me many years ago for a Sports Illustrated piece. Here it is, in his own words:

We met in a bar — and I hasten to add it was an…

GLENDALE, Ariz. — NCAA president Charlie Baker said before Monday’s men’s basketball championship game that the organization remains concerned about gambling in college sports but added that “we’re kind of in the top of the first inning on this one,” particularly when it comes to prop betting.

“Did any of you notice how much time was spent on cable TV about Caitlin Clark’s prop performance (after the) first (national semifinals) game leading into the second game?” Baker said. “Was that really what we should be talking about in the middle of a women’s Final Four? I think the answer for that for most people is no.”

Baker, who in March completed his first year as NCAA president, talked to reporters for about 15 minutes before Purdue and Connecticut squared off. He was excited and encouraged about the women’s Final Four. He also discussed measures the NCAA is taking to help college athletes and their families better understand the name, image and likeness landscape.

In a statement released in March, Baker announced that the NCAA is “drawing the line” to better protect athletes and the integrity of sports. Prop bets…

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — In the roughly 30 seconds it takes to walk from the entrance to Alabama’s football headquarters to the office occupied by coach Kalen DeBoer, you will pass at least a dozen poster-board-sized pictures of the coach’s predecessor. In most of them, Nick Saban is hoisting a national championship trophy.

At lunch on this random early April afternoon, the restaurant’s TV shows “The Paul Finebaum Show.” The host is interviewing Alabama draft prospect Chris Braswell. A bright red graphic beneath him reads “Nick Saban retired after 28 seasons as FBS head coach.”

Saban is not physically present at Alabama’s spring practice that afternoon, but the man is still on people’s minds.

“I miss him,” one practice observer says to another.

DeBoer arrived in January, just days after leading Washington in the national championship game against Michigan. Saban and his wife, Terry, sat in the front row at his Jan. 13 introductory news conference. The seven-time national champ has largely stayed away since, spending most of his time at his home in Jupiter, Fla. But he’s also spent some time in his new office at Bryant-Denny Stadium — only a couple of blocks from DeBoer’s.

DeBoer might be following a legend, but the legend is also unwittingly following the…

It could be an elevator, a hallway or a corridor this weekend at one of the Final Fours, the men’s in Arizona or the women’s in Cleveland. Greg Sankey, commissioner of the SEC, has a team in each, so doubtless he will be at both. Len Perna, meanwhile, has an idea, and if he sees Sankey he may do everything in his power to get a minute.

At most, Sankey will smile politely, nod and keep the conversation short. For now, the chances of Sankey and his conference wanting any part of Perna’s idea are about as good as the SEC giving up football as a varsity sport.

Because that’s essentially what it would be doing here.

The notion of a college football “Super League” has been percolating for a while, and one idea finally went public on Wednesday, when The Athletic reported that a number of power brokers, including the presidents at Syracuse and West Virginia and Perna, the CEO of TurnkeyZRG, were pushing for a 70-team permanent group, employing athletes as players, making its own rules and leaving non-football sports to the existing conferences, as is.

Publicly, the reaction among SEC power brokers was crickets: Sankey and the presidents at…

Louisiana is banning licensed sportsbooks in the state from offering prop bets on college athletes.

The ban will go into effect Aug. 1, 2024, at 8 a.m. local time.

“It is the intention of the Louisiana Gaming Control Board to protect the integrity of sports betting as well as the safety and integrity of college athletes,” Louisiana Gaming Control Board chairman Ronnie Johns said in a statement. “We feel that this order accomplishes that goal.”

Prop bets allow fans to bet on how many points or rebounds a basketball player might have, or yards or touchdowns a football player might have, instead of or in conjunction with a game’s outcome or spread.

Bettors in Louisiana and the 37 other states where sports betting is legal can still bet on the totals, point spreads and outcomes of games. Prop bets on “full team statistical outcomes” will still be allowed in Louisiana.

Vermont, Ohio and Maryland banned college prop bets recently and other states have expressed an openness to bans or an examination of the issue within their states. Colorado, Arizona, Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania and Oregon have rules in place prohibiting them. Illinois, Connecticut and Iowa don’t allow them for in-state teams.

Last week, NCAA president Charlie Baker released a statement calling…

The transfer portal opened March 18 for men’s and women’s basketball, which meant Rachael Bacchus was having anything but a normal day.

Normal days barely exist for Bacchus, the general manager for NIL at Arizona State. Her job is to stay on top of policy changes, court rulings, portal windows and everything else that goes into the ever-changing world of name, image and likeness. When a season ends and the portal opens, the bidding begins. For Bacchus, that means having in-depth conversations with coaches and players about what the athlete is earning, what’s being offered and what Arizona State can do to retain its players.

“We’re understanding how collectives on the outside are operating, making sure our coaches know our starting forward is being reached out to and DM’ed and having conversations from other collectives,” Bacchus said. “‘Here’s what we’re up against. Here’s what he made last year in NIL through his disclosures.’ In your exit interviews with him, if he says, ‘Hey, coach, I want more NIL,’ here’s how you know what ‘more’ is.”

Bacchus is an employee of Altius Sports Partners, a consulting firm that advises athletic departments on NIL. Altius has general managers overseeing NIL programs at 18 schools, with Michigan soon to become…

NCAA president Charlie Baker wants a ban on prop bets in college sports, he said in a statement released Wednesday.

“The NCAA is drawing the line on sports betting to protect student-athletes and to protect the integrity of the game – issues across the country these last several days show there is more work to be done,” Baker said.

Prop bets allow fans to bet on how many points or rebounds a basketball player might have, or yards or touchdowns a football player might have, instead of or in conjunction with a game’s outcome or spread.

Fans can bet on the outcomes of games but in many of the 38 states where sports betting is legal, prop bets are not allowed in college sports.

Baker wants that reach extended to all states.

“This week we will be contacting officials across the country in states that allow these bets and ask them to join Ohio, Vermont, Maryland and many others and remove college prop bets from all betting markets,” Baker said.

Some players have been subject to individualized harassment if their play resulted in a prop bet going against bettors, regardless of the outcome of the game. Baker has previously explored legislation that would create a “prohibited bettors list” of people who were known to harass players and coaches.

Baker, who played basketball at…

By Bruce Feldman, Nicole Auerbach and Christopher Kamrani

Washington State athletic director Pat Chun is leaving to join archrival Washington, program sources confirmed to The Athletic on Tuesday. Chun’s move comes one day after Washington State men’s basketball coach Kyle Smith announced he was leaving for Stanford, who joins the ACC this year.

Washington State remains one of the two remaining members of the Pac-12 conference.

Chun spent a half-dozen years at WSU after serving as FAU’s athletic director. Chun led the Cougars through a very turbulent time in recent years, most notably with the school being left behind when the Pac-12 collapsed. Washington and Oregon were able to join USC and UCLA in the move to the Big Ten, and the fallout from that upheaval is still being felt around Pullman.

Chun, an Ohio native, has Big Ten roots having spent 15 years at Ohio State working in the Buckeyes athletics department. He was considered a candidate for the OSU AD vacancy this winter, but the job ended up going to Texas A&M’s Ross Bjork.

The Chun move comes a week after Troy Dannen accepted Nebraska’s athletic director job just six months after he arrived at Washington. Dannen is replacing Trev Alberts, who left to become the AD at Texas A&M, replacing Bjork.

“I love Pat,…

With ESPN’s direct-to-consumer plan, the network is attempting to uphold its mission statement of, “Serving sports fans. Anytime. Anywhere.”

In the process, Disney CEO Bob Iger and ESPN chairman Jimmy Pitaro are looking to make deals. Anytime. Anywhere.

Iger and Pitaro are trying, through equity stake talks with the biggest leagues and with distribution discussions with the largest digital players, to add to ESPN’s already impressive content lineup and have price points to serve every sports fan.

It all sounds simple, but they are engaged in complicated negotiations with a full ESPN direct-to-consumer subscription product launching this fall in combination with Fox and Warner Bros. Discovery, and then ESPN’s standalone service slated for 2025.

At a fee of more than $10 per subscriber, no company has been more important to the cable bundle than ESPN, and no one has benefited more. While ESPN will still be offered on cable, Disney/ESPN are trying to stack the sports content and distribution deck even more in their favor.

In 2011, ESPN peaked with 100 million cable homes, according to Nielsen, but now is at around 71 million homes. One of the overarching goals for Iger and Pitaro is to reverse the subscriber trend with its direct-to-consumer plan.

ESPN’s goal is to sell…