AMELIA ISLAND — The Atlantic Coast Conference’s Spring Meetings were drama-filled to say the least.

And while Florida State and Clemson fans would think the hottest topics were about the ACC’s lawsuits with the Seminoles and Tigers, we were struck by the magnitude of another critical issue being circulated among administrators, a two-page document that included the details of an imminent settlement in the House vs. NCAA antitrust lawsuit, which could cost member institutions in the Power 4 as much as $30 million per year to avoid a much larger anti-trust verdict in January 2025.

Copies of that two-page document were secured by Yahoo Sports, TheOsceola.com’s parent company, and commanded sidebar conversations.

“If they reject a proposed settlement offer, officials from the NCAA and power conferences stand to face a catastrophic $20 billion in back damages as well as risking a bankruptcy filing, according to documents obtained by Yahoo Sports,” Ross Dellenger wrote in a must-read story.

The document details terms of a potential settlement in three impending anti-trust lawsuits (House, Hubbard and Carter) that have been brought against the NCAA and its Power 4 conferences seeking back pay for various athlete compensation elements as well as shared revenue for the next 10 years.

Dellenger details three main concepts:

- Billions in back damages;

- A new compensation model permitting schools to share as much as $22 million annually with athletes in a capped system

- And an overhaul of the NCAA scholarship and roster structure that could increase scholarship costs by an additional $10 million.

“The document reviews settlement concepts in detail as well as particulars around the new compensation model,” Dellenger writes. “It also provides university leaders with new information on hot-button topics, such as how a settlement protects the NCAA from future legal challenges, Title IX’s application and the enforcement of booster-led collectives in a ‘new infrastructure.’

“Documents specify, perhaps for the first time in writing, the total amount in back damages owed to athletes for the use of their name, image and likeness (NIL) before the NCAA lifted NIL prohibitions in 2021.

“The amount is $2.776 billion.”

If the NCAA and the Power 4 conferences choose to fight this in a court, with a Supreme Court that has made it very clear where they stand on anti-trust issues, the verdict could be catastrophic, Dellenger details within the story.

“Much of what is included in the document are already agreed-upon terms that have been disseminated as power conference commissioners work to gain consensus from their league administrators and presidents to authorize the deal,” Dellenger wrote. “Industry leaders describe the next two weeks as, perhaps, the most consequential in college athletics history, laying out a timeline for potential ratification of a deal as soon as next week.”

As you read this, you may be wondering how much the language is amplified by plaintiff’s lawyers. All I can report to you is the language was heard loud and clear by those on Amelia Island. This includes ACC commissioner Jim Phillips, who must take a vote of the membership as to settle or not.

While Phillips was limited in what he could say about the litigation, he told us what he could about what he calls a “seismic shift” toward the professionalization of collegiate athletics — and its financial impact on campus athletic programs — which dominated sidebar conversations if not the content of the athletic director meetings.

“It’s not when (the negotiated settlement) happens, it’s happening now,” Phillips told the media in his closing remarks. “It just didn’t start in the last few months. It has started over the last several years.”

Florida State Athletics Director Michael Alford was asked to comment on the proposed settlement, which he said has been discussed. “It is going to be an industry decision,” Alford said. “The conferences will be able to weigh in on it. But at the end of the day, that’s an industry decision and we’ll have to adapt and make do. We’re doing everything internally to be sure we can adjust quickly.”

Alford was also asked if the lawsuit, scheduled for a January 2025 court date, or the impending settlement, which could come as early as next week, has stimulated action in Washington, D.C. NCAA President Charlie Baker, conference commissioners and athletic directors – Alford included – have been lobbying Congress for years for help.

There’s been multiple hearings but little progress toward any meaningful legislation.

“There’s a lot of interest in what the future of collegiate athletics looks like and that’s great to see with that with everything that’s going on,” Alford said. “They have a lot of other issues they are handling in DC besides collegiate athletics, but I would say the interest is still there.”

One year ago, if you had suggested collegiate athletics was this close to an era of professionalism, you would have been scoffed by at but here we are.

How quickly the collegiate athletic world spins.

“We’ve got really good information,” Phillips said about the settlement. “The idea is should we settle now or not, and I think that’s a question for each of the boards across the country, conference boards, as well as the NCAA. We have met with the plaintiff’s attorneys multiple times, not just recently but over the course of the last 18 months.”

Phillips said the ACC Board, which includes 15 presidents and chancellors, has met weekly and that a majority vote of that board will cast the ACC’s vote. “We’re all (conferences) getting to a point where we’ll have to vote soon,” Phillips said. “I don’t have a specific date in mind, but it will be sooner than later.”

As if Phillips didn’t have enough distractions on Amelia Island this week, more drama was brewing back in the ACC’s home state, drama that led UNC athletics director Bubba Cunningham to leave beautiful Amelia Island early to answer heavily publicized criticism of the UNC athletic budget — and what could be more-national story. Cunningham did not attend Wednesday morning’s final discussion to wrap up the ACC spring meetings.

According to WRAL NEWS: “The UNC Board of Trustees approved an audit of the school's athletic department Monday morning amid concerns and anger over the Tar Heels' revenue, management and changes to college sports.”

The board met in a closed session on Wednesday and Thursday, demanding further discussion with Cunningham. "I think it's imperative for the board to hear all of this in closed session," chairman John Preyer said during a special meeting on Monday. "I don't think they understand the level of bad data that has been provided, and I think it is incumbent on us to get it right."

Trustee Dave Boliek, a former chairman, said after the meeting there was an "imbalance in the budget" that required shifting dollars from other fund balances to cover the cost of athletics. He said the board hasn't been given a strategy on how UNC will move forward.

As a former Seminole Booster Sr. Vice President, I will tell you it is not uncommon for approved funds to be transferred to balance the athletics budget during regular business. For example, Seminole Boosters, Inc. raises money on behalf of athletics, then transfers approximately $17 million from its annual fund to athletics to fund scholarships and to help balance the annual budget. Other funds are transferred from the scholarship endowment earnings to athletics to pay the cost of scholarships. Or, during Covid, investment funds were liquidated and transferred to help balance the athletics budget.

My experience tells me this trustee’s quote has less to do with fund transfers than it does with the latter part of that quote, “and changes to college sports.”

But what got the Amelia hens clucking and the cocks crowing, were these quotes by former UNC Board Chairman Dave Boliek. "Carolina's ability to maintain excellence at a high level is going to require really prudent budgeting and revenue models and potential cost cutting," Boliek said. "A lot of it is due to the revenue or lack thereof of revenue that we're not receiving from the ACC deal."

Welcome to reality. Jump on in. The water is warm.

The article explains the math that Florida State and Clemson know all too well: The ACC distributes about $40 million per school to its member institutions while the SEC and BIG 10 are projected to distribute up to $70 million in coming years due to growing media rights agreements and the SEC and BIG 10 will receive more money than the ACC each year in the College Football Playoff.

"It's not something you can chance with the snap of a finger," Boliek said. "It's something we've got to be cognizant of. We can't sit back and cross our fingers and pray for pennies from heaven and thinking everything is going to 'work out.' We have to actively pursue what's in the best interests of Carolina athletics."

The article notes FSU and Clemson have sued the ACC seeking to lessen their fees and penalties for leaving and that’s exactly what at least Trustee Boliek wants UNC to do. "I am advocating for that," he said. "That's what we need to do. We need to do everything we can to get there. Or the alternative is the ACC is going to have to reconstruct itself. I think all options are on the table."

While UNC, arguably the flagship property of the ACC, has yet to formally file plans to leave the league, Chairman Preyer told WRAL in March that the ACC was failing its top schools, including North Carolina.

"The conference is not acting as if it is representing the best interests of the member schools including the top tier of those schools - Clemson, Florida State, and North Carolina," Preyer said.

"Instead, it is acting at the expense of those schools to prop up the bottom tier of the conference in a way that I think is a gross abdication of responsibility. And I lay that at the feet of the commissioner."

I’ll remind you these are the words of the UNC Board of Trustees and not those of FSU Board of Trustee Chairman Peter Collins, but they do echo familiar, don’t they.

“I’ve been here, so I haven’t honestly seen everything, but understand, there’s been some conversation,” Phillips said. “Those are campus discussions and campus politics, so I don’t know what’s true and what’s not. So, we’ll stay close to that and when I get back to Charlotte will find out a little bit more.”

No matter how passionate you feel about getting out of the Atlantic Coast Conference, you may also feel some empathy for Phillips, and other conference commissioners, who find themself having to fly a plane that is being redesigned by lawyers and Supreme Court Justices who probably couldn’t tell you if the game ball is puffed or stuffed. But fly it he must and with 10,000 or more ACC student-athletes on board.

There were many important topics about ACC accomplishments, and progress initiatives, discussed at these ACC Spring Meetings, more than we can share in a single story. So, we’ll break those important topics up into a series of stories over the coming week, including new information about the thorny issues House vs. NCAA presents, the impending lawsuits with Florida State and Clemson, conference distribution, success initiates and more.

Sign up for the Osceola's free daily email newsletters

Follow The Osceola on Facebook

Follow The Osceola on Twitter

Subscribe to the Osceola's YouTube channel

Subscribe to the Osceola's podcasts on Apple