FROM THE BLEACHERS-747
BY DR. JACK WELCH
When College Football Became Professional
The national title game between Miami and Indiana will be remembered not just for the final score, but for what it represents. Indiana, a program long respected for basketball stands as the national champion for the first time in history. This would have been unthinkable just a few years ago. In today’s college football landscape, it makes perfect sense.
Indiana didn’t stumble into a national championship. They built it the modern way, through the transfer portal and NIL. This was not a slow build; multi-year plan defined by redshirts and recruiting classes growing together. This was a rapid transformation fueled by money, movement, and immediate results.
College football has abandoned tradition, it has become professional sports. The programs willing to change and invest accordingly have a chance to win. That is what Indiana did.
College football is no longer amateur athletics. Indiana’s football roster reportedly carried roughly $21.1 million in NIL spending, with marquee players like quarterback Fernando Mendoza earning more than $2 million. When you factor in total football operations expenses surpassing $61 million, the scale begins to resemble professional franchises more than traditional college programs.
Miami was in the same boat. Both teams took the field with rosters assembled less like college depth charts and more like professional free-agent lists. These weren’t freshmen growing into men within a system. These were proven players, recruited nationally and internationally, placed into schemes designed to win now.
History will judge today’s college coaches differently than those of the past. Yesterday’s great coaches were measured by how they built programs, developed players, and mastered the game itself. Today’s coaches are increasingly evaluated by how well they build rosters, manage NIL, navigate the portal, and assemble talent. The question for the future won’t be whether one era was better than the other, but whether coaching greatness can still be defined by teaching and leadership in a game now driven by acquisition and economics.
Indiana’s national championship is not an anomaly. It’s a blueprint. Spend wisely. Win the portal and raise the necessary funding. If done correctly, history can be rewritten in a single offseason.
College football didn’t die, it evolved into the professional ranks. Make no mistake, what we watched between Miami and Indiana wasn’t amateur athletics. It was professional football wearing college uniforms.
Thought for the week, “Change is inevitable. Those who adapt thrive, those who resist get left behind.” Jack Welch
Dr. Jack Welch serves as President of Fort Scott Community College. With a career spanning professional sports, public education, and rural community development, he brings a servant-leader mindset and a passion for building trust-driven cultures that empower people to thrive in the classroom, on the field, and in life. He is also the author of Foundations of Coaching: The Total Coaching Manual.