Written by: David Mullins, ITA President & CEO
For decades, college athletics existed somewhere between education and professional sports. That distinction is disappearing quickly.
NIL compensation, revenue sharing, unrestricted transfers, conference realignment, and relentless litigation have transformed NCAA Division I athletics. In many respects, these changes have been positive. Student-athletes have greater freedom, economic opportunity, and control over their careers.
But as we celebrate those gains, we should also be willing to ask an uncomfortable question:
At what point does college athletics become professional sports played by individuals who happen to attend college?
College tennis provides a fascinating case study.
The sport has never been more connected to professional tennis. Some of the world’s best young players now view college as a legitimate pathway to the ATP and WTA Tours. In 2026, we’ve seen Stanford’s Arthur Fery make the semi-final of Wimbledon while the University of Florida’s Ben Shelton went one step further to the final of the US Open. College coaches have become sophisticated talent developers, facilities have improved dramatically, and the level of competition has never been higher.
Those are accomplishments worth celebrating.
But there is another side to professionalization.
The pressure to win increasingly incentivizes coaches to recruit more experienced and sometimes older players capable of producing immediate results, not just in the sport of tennis but across all sports. In some cases, athletes arrive on campus after spending significant time competing in the professional tennis ecosystem. Younger developmental players—including American juniors—can find themselves competing for roster opportunities against athletes with substantially more professional-level competitive experience.
Age alone, however, does not explain the issue—and it should not become a proxy for nationality. Current NCAA Division I roster data show that international players are, on average, about two months and eight days older than American players on men’s NCAA DI teams and just 22 days older on NCAA DI women’s teams. A few unusual cases may draw attention online, but the broader age gap is small. The question is how college athletics should account for extensive professional experience, regardless of where an athlete was born.
We should be willing to examine whether that is the model college athletics ultimately wants.
That does not mean blaming international student-athletes. International players have enriched American higher education and college tennis for generations. They raise the competitive level of our sport, bring different cultures to our campuses and often become extraordinary ambassadors for their universities.
Politicians on Capitol Hill are now debating proposals to restrict international participation in college athletics, potentially via the TEAM USA Act. While concerns about opportunities for American athletes deserve serious consideration, an arbitrary federal nationality cap risks treating the symptom rather than the underlying problem.
If a policy makes it more difficult for universities to field competitive tennis teams, some institutions may not simply replace international players with Americans. This is more than a hypothetical concern. When Idaho lawmakers considered limits on scholarships for international student-athletes earlier this year, University of Idaho athletic director Terry Gawlik said the school would strongly consider dropping both its men’s and women’s tennis teams if the bill passed. The proposal did not become law, but the warning was clear: a policy intended to expand opportunities could instead eliminate the teams that provide them.
A policy designed to create opportunities for American athletes should not inadvertently eliminate the programs providing those opportunities.
There is a better conversation to have.
College sports organizations, universities and national governing bodies should strengthen pathways for American juniors, examine eligibility rules surrounding extensive professional experience, create incentives for developmental opportunities and ensure that college athletics remains meaningfully connected to education. The ITA is actively engaged in these discussions and has a role in shaping them, but the NCAA ultimately determines its own eligibility standards.
At the same time, those of us in Olympic sports must confront another reality. Football and basketball increasingly drive the economics of major college athletics. Revenue sharing and escalating expenses will force university leaders to scrutinize every other sport they sponsor.
Tennis therefore cannot afford simply to defend the status quo.
We must generate greater value for our campuses. We need to open college facilities to communities, create new revenue opportunities, build better events, tell more compelling stories, and connect college tennis more deeply with the broader tennis industry.
College tennis can provide an elite pathway to professional tennis, welcome outstanding international athletes, and expand opportunities for American players, all while remaining rooted in education and the campus experience. In doing so, it can continue its decades-long tradition of developing future leaders across a wide range of industries.
Those objectives are not mutually exclusive, but achieving them requires something increasingly rare in college athletics: restraint.
Not every rule should be designed solely to produce the highest possible level of competition. Not every decision should be driven exclusively by winning. And not every feature of professional sports should automatically migrate into college athletics simply because the legal environment allows it.
The professionalization of college sports is not going away.
The challenge now is ensuring that, somewhere along the way, we don’t professionalize the college out of college athletics.
About the ITA: The Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) is the governing body and coaches association of college tennis, both an advocate and an authority for the sport and its members. Comprised of 1,260 colleges and universities, 20,000 student-athletes, 1,700 varsity programs, 3,000 coaches, and 1,350 college tennis officials, the ITA empowers college tennis coaches at all levels to deliver vibrant tennis programs that are vital to their college communities and transformational to their student-athletes. Follow the college tennis season on the ITA website and ITA social channels on Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook, and YouTube.
ITA Media Contact: If you have further questions, please contact Zach Pohlmann at [email protected]
Source: wearecollegetennis.com
