“If you’re a college athlete or an aspiring one, listen up.”
In a video posted to Instagram, Jake Rimmel faces a tripod he set up at the Woodgrove High School track, not far from his home in northern Virginia. His voice is solemn.
“The NCAA’s roster limits are actively destroying opportunities for thousands of athletes,” Rimmel says in the video. “Including me.”
After Thanksgiving break last fall, Rimmel, along with four other athletes, was told he would no longer have a spot on the Virginia Tech track and cross-country teams. “That was definitely a day when my world kind of shifted,” Rimmel said to Runner’s World.
Heartbroken, Rimmel finished out the semester, then moved back to his hometown, where he’s taking classes at a community college and training on his own. His goal is to transfer to another school and compete. “It hasn’t been easy, I’ve had a lot of stress,” he said. “It’s a lot of uncertainty right now.”
The reason he was cut is becoming more common. Rimmel said he was told that Virginia Tech would be trimming the team to conform the impending roster limits tied to the CA Notice at Collection.
The settlement, in short, will allow Division I universities to share revenue with its athletes—upwards of $20 million in the first year—most of which is expected to go toward football programs, and, to a lesser extent, men’s basketball programs. Schools from the Power 4 conferences (ACC, Big Ten, Big 12, and SEC) will likely opt in to revenue sharing.
Also included in the settlement is a clause about roster limits. Under current rules, college teams may have an unlimited number of athletes on their rosters, but they are bound by scholarship limits. Track and field and cross-country teams can have up to 18 total women’s scholarships and 12.6 men’s scholarships, which can be partially divided.
The new roster rules (which only apply to schools that opt in to the settlement) would eliminate scholarship quotas and instead put a limit on the total roster size. Cross-country would be allotted 17 spots per gender, and track and field would get 45, but cross-country spots count toward track spots. In other words, schools won’t have 17 XC spots plus 45 track spots—there will be a total of 45.
Schools could theoretically offer as many scholarships as they have roster spots, but few track programs are expected to do so due to budgetary constraints.
If the settlement is approved at a hearing scheduled for April 7 by Judge Claudia Wilken, these changes will go into effect for the 2025-2026 school year. No athletes will be grandfathered in.
swimming and diving.
Published: Mar 26, 2025 11:57 AM EDT Runner’s World that some schools, which plan to opt in to the settlement, are already preemptively clearing space. Some athletes have been told they are still on the team, but if roster limits are approved, they will no longer have a spot.
In January, Yahoo Sports reported that over 4,000 athletes (across all sports) from Power-4 schools could be cut by the new rules and, depending on how many schools opt into the settlement, that number could reach over 15,000 across Division I.
Experts believe roster limits were included in the settlement so the NCAA can avoid anti-trust lawsuits in the future. But many track and field athletes, parents, and coaches feel like they’re being penalized as a result.
From far-off to reality
Alec Miller first heard rumblings about roster changes last summer while he was training with some friends in Flagstaff, Arizona. A few months later in October, Miller—a sophomore distance runner at the University of Florida—saw an Instagram post from Joshua Grenade announcing that the SEC would impose even stricter roster limits for their men’s cross-country and track teams. The conference will set its numbers at 10 for cross-country and 35 for track.
“I remember just staring at my screen for probably a minute or two just not moving,” Miller said. “Just like, ‘Wow, okay … this is reality now, it’s not a hypothetical.’”
Miller could see the writing on the wall. He was one of the better runners in the state of Florida during high school, but he had a rough freshman year in college, struggling with injuries. He knows he’s likely among a group of athletes who would be cut. According to its 2025 team page, Florida has 56 men on the track team and 19 listed on its fall 2024 cross-country team. Miller thinks that unless an athlete on the team is scoring points at the NCAA championships, they could be at risk of being cut.
For Miller, that means he feels he’s fighting for his career this track season. The threat is looming over his teammates in similar positions.
“I feel like in terms of the year in general, [there’s] a lot of stress for sure,” he said. “Maybe there are people that are handling it better in terms of not thinking about it and just being able to go with the flow, but it definitely just feels like there’s so much more weight on everything that I do.”
Miller and Rimmel are both quick to emphasize that they don’t blame their coaches or school for the constrictions. They know it’s a number’s game and is, to a certain extent, out of their coaches’ hands. But it’s still a hard pill to swallow.
Development concerns
Coaches around the country have started to voice their displeasure of the settlement’s roster limits as well. In early March, an email was circulated by some of the most prominent coaches in the sport, calling their peers across the country to action. The email stated the potential ramifications of the House settlement could cause budgets of Olympic sports to shrink—or be cut altogether—and cited concerns with the roster limits.
Mark Fairley is well-acquainted with the new numbers. As an assistant coach at Liberty University, he works with a developmental group of women’s distance runners. There are 31 total distance runners on the women’s team and the track team has 67 athletes. The Liberty coaching staff has already informed the team that many athletes could be cut if the current numbers go into effect.
The team plans on having 17 spots for cross-country, but since XC spots count toward the track total, Fairley thinks that all 17 won’t be distance runners. Liberty has a well-balanced track team—the Flames won the Conference USA indoor team title this season and routinely qualify athletes for the NCAA championships—so Fairley expects some of that quota to be made of middle-distance runners and possibly some 400-meter hurdlers. Otherwise, the team would only have 28 track-specific athletes, which wouldn’t allow for much depth across events.
His development group, in effect, would evaporate. Currently over half of his runners are freshman, and athletes who get injured will sometimes temporarily join his group while they’re getting back in shape. His squad also acts as a stepping stone; It’s not uncommon to have walk-ons earn scholarships after improving their times.
“I want the judge to see that this impacts so many people that aren’t just a number, and they are actually humans that have a life, and have plans, and are hardworking athletes that are missing out on opportunities,” he said.
Rimmel considers himself one of these athletes. An “underdog,” in his words. He was good in high school, where he was key contributor on Loudoun Valley High School’s powerhouse team, and he came to Virginia Tech as a preferred walk-on.
But he points out that many top distance runners need time to train and get race experience. “I think a lot of people don’t see that some of these great runners now, they might have had to take two or three years to actually develop into something great,” he said.
The cost of cuts
Not only will roster cuts take away opportunities for athletes, but it will have financial consequences, as well.
Shoes & Gear Runner’s World that the settlement could cause financial stress for her daughter, who is a member of a nationally-ranked Power-4 cross-country team. Her daughter was told last semester that roster cuts would likely be coming at her school and that she was among those who would be affected if the settlement passes.
The parent said that her daughter would lose about $25,000 in total benefits per year if she is cut. She could lose her Alston stipend ($5,980 per year), health insurance, as well as summer school expenses that the athletic department covers.
“It doesn’t seem fair,” the mother said. “Which, life isn’t fair, I know. But [if] this settlement’s going through, she’s losing that money, she’s losing her roster spot, so other people can be paid.”
If Miller is cut from the Florida team, he will likely stay there as a normal student. He gets in-state tuition and said the school has told him that they will honor his athletic scholarship through graduation if he loses his spot. It’s unclear, however, if he would miss out on other athlete perks, like academic advisors and access to the athlete dining hall, which provides three meals a day and snacks.
A new normal
Smaller roster sizes will also have ripple effects on recruiting strategy. With fewer spots, some coaches will likely be forced to focus their recruiting efforts on high-end talent—particularly, graduate transfers and international athletes who have already run fast times—instead of taking chances on high school athletes who may need more time to develop and adjust to college athletics.
In the aforementioned coaches email, this is addressed. “While some programs may thrive, others could be forced to make difficult cuts, diminishing opportunities for development and recruitment. This may also encourage programs to recruit only fully developed athletes internationally, potentially reducing access for U.S. athletes.”
Miller thinks even if he makes the cut and secures a spot next year, the stress and uncertainty isn’t going to go away. Each year will be the same: prove yourself or lose your spot. This mindset, he thinks, could encourage some athletes to push through injuries or rush their training to demonstrate their value. “I just feel like every year is going to be a fight,” he said.
Still, he’s optimistic and certainly willing to rise to the challenge: “I’m okay with walking away from something as long as I know that I put 110 percent effort out there.”
On March 17, a group filed a formal objection that, among other reasons, claims that the House settlement “creates gross unfairness through its roster limits” and therefore the settlement should not be approved. The objection cites dozens of athletes in other sports like Hey, Runners: Yes, Downhill PRs Count, golf, and football who have been cut or are threatened to be cut.
“The [NCAA and plaintiffs] never explain why lifting scholarship caps requires any roster limits, much less the arbitrary limits of the settlement,” the objection reads.
While the settlement was preliminarily approved in October, Judge Wilken could finalize it at a hearing scheduled for April 7.
Meanwhile, Rimmel will continue to control what he can control. He raced unattached at a handful of meets during indoor season with mixed results. He returned to Virginia Tech in mid January to race a mile, but he dropped out around 1200 meters in. He admits he wanted to prove he belonged, but the self-imposed pressure was suffocating.
After that, he regrouped with his support system to switch his perspective. “I had to reset my mindset, and I almost feel like I’m racing not just to prove a point to people, you know, I’m racing for myself and that really helped me,” he said.
He’s found, though, that switching to a new school is not an easy process. He’s entered in the transfer portal, but he’s not getting many bites. Most coaches are dealing with the same problems as Virginia Tech—their rosters are full, and they’re waiting to see how the settlement shakes out.
Regardless, Rimmel feels like he’s been reduced to a line item by the NCAA.
“The NCAA should work for us athletes and have our best interests,” he said. “I feel like right now they’re not having our best interests, and I feel like us athletes are being devalued, and we’re more of a numbers game to them.”
Best New Balance Shoes Runner’s World. He’s a former all-conference collegiate runner at Winthrop University, and he received his master’s degree in liberal arts studies from Wake Forest University, where he was a member of one of the top distance-running teams in the NCAA. Kahler has reported on the ground at major events such as the Paris Olympics, U.S. Olympic Trials, New York City Marathon, and Boston Marathon. He’s run 14:20 in the 5K, 1:05:36 in the half marathon, and enjoys spotting tracks from the sky on airplanes. (Look for colorful ovals around football fields.)
