Why Sports Fans Should Cheer on the SCORE Act | Congressman Tim Walberg
If you love college sports — the sound of the marching band, the pride of seeing your alma mater on the field, the thrill of an underdog story — you know that college athletics isn’t just about competition. It’s about community, opportunity and character. But behind the bright lights and roaring crowds, a quiet crisis has been building: student athletes at risk of exploitation, schools navigating a patchwork of conflicting state laws, and a system struggling to keep up.
That’s why I’m proud to support the Student Compensation and Opportunity through Rights and Endorsements (SCORE) Act — a bipartisan effort to bring fairness, transparency and accountability to college sports.
NIL and the SCORE act
We all recognize that the era of Name, Image, and Likeness (NIL) has transformed college sports. Student athletes finally have the ability to financially benefit from their hard work and even build a brand. That’s a good thing. But without a national framework, NIL has become a Wild West pay-for-play system that tilts recruiting, distorts competition, and leaves both student athletes and universities wondering what’s allowed and what’s not.
In some states, schools are allowed to work directly with collectives and help student athletes navigate deals. In others, they’re banned from doing so entirely. Some states allow broad NIL freedoms. Others put up strong restrictions that effectively tie the hands of their own university programs. Recruiting now depends less on coaching, culture, or education— and more to do with which state legislature updated its NIL bill last year.
That’s not competition. That’s chaos. One national framework for NIL finally brings the clarity and consistency college sports desperately need.
The SCORE Act gives student athletes and schools a single, clear set of national rules — the same rules, coast to coast. That means every university knows what it can do. Every student athlete knows what protections they have. And every fan knows the scoreboard reflects ability and teamwork, not whichever state has the loosest statute.
Not "pay for play"
The goal here isn’t to professionalize college athletics; it’s to modernize the rules so that student athletes are treated with the dignity and fairness they deserve, and so that fans can continue to enjoy the authentic competition that makes American college sports unlike anything else in the world.
That starts by preserving the core principle that makes college athletics special: student athletes are students first. NIL should empower them, not transform them into "employees", encourage them to transfer every year for a bigger payday, or prevent them from winning in and out of the classroom.
That’s why the SCORE Act creates guardrails around predatory contracts, shady pay-for-play schemes, and outside actors who see student athletes as quick profits rather than young students pursuing a dream. It ensures student athletes get access to real academic counseling and career support. It protects scholarships from being pulled over injuries. It keeps their long-term success — not just their market value — at the forefront.
Power to the players
Because for every national champion with a big brand deal, there are thousands of student athletes trying to earn degrees that will carry them into the rest of their lives and playing for the love of the game. They deserve a system that protects them, too.
As sports fans, we’re never shy about using our voices—yelling and cheering every play. Now, as NIL reshapes college sports and leaves student athletes open to exploitation, it’s time to use those same loud voices for something bigger. The SCORE Act gives us that power—to stand up and support the players and system we love.
I’m all in. And if you want college sports to remain the greatest show in America — you should be too.