Five years into the NIL era, the college sports debate has centered on pay: revenue-sharing caps, third-party deals and the Protect College Sports Act of 2026, which passed the Senate on Sept. 28 and is expected to come before the House after Nov. 9. But college sports’ most valuable products, including replica jerseys, video games, trading cards and co-branded merchandise, require two sets of rights that have never been cleanly combined: the school’s trademarks and the NIL of many athletes at once. The bill touches both but never says how they fit together. We expect the next major value fight to be over how licensing deals are structured, not over paychecks.

What the senate bill actually says about groups

The bill’s only operative rule on group use is Section 101(a)(2). It provides that a school, conference, athletic association, collective or third party “may not use the name, image, or likeness of any group of student athletes to sell or promote any product or service” unless it “obtains an agreement from each member of the group for that purpose.”

In other words, it is an individual-consent rule dressed up as a group rule: Every athlete shown has a veto.

Three further details matter for dealmakers. First, despite a heading promising “consent and compensation,” the text requires only an agreement, with no minimum payment or fair-market-value pricing. Second, the bill does not define “group of student athletes,” so it is unclear whether two teammates, a starting lineup or a full roster triggers the rule. Third, the rule covers only groups. Whether a school needs a star........

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